The Maker Forgives
by goddess-orchid
Summary: After the destruction of the Chantry, the pressure's of walking the Maker's path have take there toll on Knight-Commander Cullen. His life is peppered with betrayals, and each place he dares to call home becomes tainted. Still haunted by the horrors of the tower and Uldred's demons, he summons the only woman he trusts to be honest with him. Yet all he wants to do is turn back time.
1. Chapter 1

_***I wrote this story not in the hopes that you'd like Cullen or my Warden, but in the hopes that maybe you can understand why someone might. Life is complicated. When we are young we can't wait to grow up, but when we are older we wish we could go back.*** rights were applicable to Bioware/EA***_

_Intro:_

_Cullen does not know why he came. Kirkwall, years later, remains in shambles, and Starkhaven demands fealty like never before. The prince, or more so the king, had been a good man. They had talked in the Chantry, and Cullen had offered him condolences. Now he demanded that someone pay for letting Hawke and the apostate bastard go, and that someone was Cullen. He slumps down in his seat, but his armor is uncomfortable, so all he can do is lean forward and bury his face in his hands. Starkhaven's ruler wanted to avenge Elthina, and that made perfect sense, but what was Cullen to do? If not for Hawke his men would have slaughtered every man, woman, and child in the circle regardless of whether they used blood magic. Not that they didn't come close. The number of dead was staggering and in that first year it wasn't all from the fight and the rebellion_.

~~~ Part 1: The Initiate

"Sir, come quick!" The young initiate, whose name slipped his mind, stared at him wide eyed from the doorway to Meredith's—no, now it was his office. He stood, and before he realized his hand was on the hilt of his sword. Mages had been escaping or outright rebelling left and right. Just last week a group of mages threatened his templars without fear. Four of the mages were struck down and two were made tranquil. By the time he had even arrived to the dining hall it had become a case of he said she said. The mages insisted the templars acted first, but every templar in the room said otherwise. He had to stand by his men. There could be no weakness in the order in front of the mages. None. Yet Cullen knew the truth behind the mask of strength and order, perhaps they all did. Chaos had become their way of life.

The two templars ran down the hall toward the mage dormitory. The sound of their armor clinking at every joint echoed throughout the gallows walls. They were emptier than they used to be, and even compared to when Meredith had confined the mages to their rooms. The silence shouldn't have unsettled him as much as it did, but it stung into him. Many evil mages had been killed, but how many innocents had fallen?

_No weakness_.

"What is it?"

"You have to see for yourself, sir. It's ...Enchanter Eldora and Apprentice Nella."

Cullen chose to ignore the young man's pained expression as he said the last mage's name. He hadn't been made a full templar yet, but every hand was needed. Perhaps it was a good thing. Cullen remembered that look, back in Ferelden after _she_ left it greeted him every day in the mirror. Shame coursed through his veins and he shook off the thought. He had heard the names of those mages many times before. Meredith had warned him to watch Eldora; She was kind to everyone who was not a templar and openly flaunted her support of the libertarians. Meredith had no proof, but was certain she was a blood mage. Meredith knew it was in her heart, but Cullen never thought it so. He had heard what made Eldora so bitter, and even he could not blame her for wanting to be free of Chantry oversight.

When he first came to Kirkwall, Eldora nearly beat a templar with her bare hands because he had forced himself on a mage. Only Orsino had saved her by telling Meredith what had happened. It was the only time Cullen ever saw Meredith take pity on a mage, and only then because Eldora hadn't used magic.

They came upon the only room with an open door. Two men stood outside the door, shaking their heads besides two of the few remaining senior enchanters. They glanced at Cullen, their faces grave. The young man went forward stopping short of the door, lowering his head, Cullen brushed past him into the room. The sight before him froze his feet, and stilled his breath. Eldora's limp form hung from the rafters, spinning listlessly in the drafty room. Her graying curls fell about her head obscuring her once severe eyes. On the bed lay Nella, her red hair strewn about her head, melding into a puddle of blood that formed a crown, and a necklace across her open neck.

"She killed the girl and hung herself. Fifth one this month." Sage, a templar only a few years his senior sighed. "Daft woman." Despite his harsh words Sage's tone was soft, as if he couldn't manage any other words.

"No. She saw where things were headed. People are still calling for the right of annulment...her friends and lover were dead or made them tranquil," Senior Enchanter Beaumont sighed. His thick Orlesian accent peppered every word, as though he were speaking a eulogy. Cullen recalled Eldora favored one of two the mage's he had made tranquil. He would see them talking in the halls, or eating beside each other.

"Rumor was that she would be next." Senior Echanter Lauren's her sky blue eyes looked to Cullen, as if now was the time to confess his sins.

"What? No! I was going to have her transferred to the Circle in Ferelden. Eldora crossed a good many templars, and tempers here are running short..."

"Maybe she knew that. She'd rather die than be separated from her daughter. It was an open secret...if not for Eldora's family and Meredith's...sympathy. They'd been separated long ago."

Cullen stepped forward, a quiet sorrow settled in his chest. Nella had begged him to talk to Meredith the day before the battle. She wanted to read for the children and see if a hall could be cleared for games. The young initiate began to recite the chant of light, and Cullen's heart stilled. The boy revealed too much. He struggled to keep his voice steady with every word. Except for himself and Lauren everyone shifted uncomfortably, lowering their heads. Sometimes he wondered what he would have done if he had found _her_ dead in some corridor during Uldred's attack. His heart would catch in his throat, and as he stood there he knew he'd be no different than the boy behind him. Mages or templars, no one deserved to die before their time. _Everyone lost something_ in the _rebellion_.

_"For there is no darkness, nor death either, in the Maker's Light,"_

_"And nothing that He has wrought shall be lost."_ The words left Cullen's lips with such ease the realization that he's spoke at all threw him off guard. He did not turn to the young man, nor did Cullen flinch.

As the two men continued Cullen heard the boy's voice become more steady, even as Cullen felt his innards quiver. "_Draw your last breath, my friends, cross the Veil and the Fade and all the stars in the sky. Rest at the Maker's right hand, and be forgiven_."

Hours later Cullen sat behind his desk, trying to relax. It felt wrong to be in Meredith's place. He didn't know how to do anything from there. The nobles were screaming, the people were fuming, and the mages were all, but openly declaring themselves free. Even those who weren't still suffered the glares of templars, glares that even Cullen struggled to restrain. "Mages, even good ones, can fall to the forces of evil..." Yet the most destruction he had ever seen had come from Meredith. Mage or templar...evil dwelled in the corners of the heart.

"Sir," The young man from earlier stood in the doorway, his shoulders heavy with sorrow. Uncertainty marred his expression, and he seemed as if he expected to be dismissed.

"Come in," Cullen paused drawing in a breath, "It is Gavin, isn't it?"

"Uh, y-yes, sir." Gavin stood before Cullen's desk. Every time he met his gaze Gavin glanced away in nervousness. "I came to apologize-"

"At ease. If this is about earlier do not think on it. "

"Thank you, sir, but it is not only that." Gavin drew in a deep breath, his hands were shaking just a little, but for the boy's sake Cullen pretended not to notice. _What could possibly be troubling him so badly_?

"Well?"

"I wish to resign my post and submit myself to whatever judgment you see fit."

Cullen raised a brow at his words uncertain of what punishment he thought he deserved for his feelings. In truth Cullen wasn't certain either, but it could not be just that troubling Gavin. His words were so vague, but Gavin straightened his posture meeting Cullen's eyes.

"What on Thedas for?"

"Before her," Gavin paused, shifting where he stood. " Before her death, apprentice Nella and I had an inappropriate relationship. I met her shortly after my training began, she was selling wares with some of the tranquil mages in the courtyard." Gavin's dark eyes softened, and sympathy washed over Cullen. Those were contentious, but happier days. "After the destruction of the Chantry our relationship became...intimate in nature."

_Some people pulled away under duress, but for others it brings them closer_. Cullen almost envied the boy, for he had known companionship and love few of the order ever _really_ did. Yet his position was that of judge and jury. Gavin and Nella committed a serious offense, and fate left Gavin alone to suffer the consequences. Still why should the boy speak out after her demise?

"Why come to me now?" Cullen laced his fingers together, never taking his eyes from Gavin's face. "Nella is dead and while you were...overly emotional today that was not grounds for anything more than suspicion."

"Knight-Commander," Cullen still half jumped at the title every time he heard it, but he remained still as Gavin gathered himself. "I have struggled these past several months with this. I betrayed my training, and my own morals because Nella had the virtue of Andraste herself. The only reason I remained silent was to protect her. "

For some reason, adrenaline began to pump through Cullen's veins and he felt his heart thump against his chest.

"You could have requested to be stationed elsewhere."

"No, my mother and father live in Kirkwall and they need everything I earn."

"Plenty of us send coin to our families." Cullen's parents had long since been dead, but no one needed to know that. Gavin was just making excuses to write off his accursed fascination with some mage.

"It's more complicated than that, Sir."

"How?" His tone was scathing, and Cullen searched for why. The man had the decency to be honest with him, but at any moment his attachment to that girl could have cost others their lives. Cullen rose to his feet, casting a penetrating glance into the man's soul. He was weak, a poor excuse for a templar. He couldn't see mages for what they were. They were to be protected, but rarely trusted and never let in. When a mage was let in a templar would be faced with impossible temptations. "You fell for the pretty face of a mage, a woman who was not only a danger to herself, but to others. Did you not think that could cloud your ability to perform your duties? What if the order called upon you to strike her down. What would you hav-"

"Nella was with child." Gavin was on the verge of breaking down into sobs. Regret grabbed at Cullen, twisting his stomach up in knots like a sickness. "She had been ill every morning and in the day, but she was happy. With the confusion I hoped we could leave Kirkwall. It took me weeks, but I convinced her of it, but Eldora would not have it." Gavin's hands were balled up in shaking fists by his side, and his voice was strangled by his own turmoil. If Cullen had been more like Greagoir he could have found the right words and the right action, but his thoughts failed him. "She believed I took advantage of her Nella, just like Nella's father did to her, but I loved her." Cullen could recall how the blood-mage Jowan and his friends would stare him down after to talking to Surana. Every time she turned away a group of Surana's friends would throw steely glances, as if have suspecting him to pounce on her at any moment. They never understood how he felt about her, yet he was her jailer. Eldora, Jowan, and anyone worth their own sanity would assume the worst."I thought maybe I convinced her of that, but after last week. When the libertarian mages tried to convene, when Ser Talbot struck down those four others. I was there and did nothing, and she saw... She must have...I don't know, but now they're both dead."

Cullen moved from behind his desk next to Gavin. He place a hand on his shoulder. Elthina said the maker moved in mysterious ways, but was that it? Did that justify anything? The young man came before him seeking punishment for events he could not control. He had committed a sin, just like Cullen, but what punishment could the Chantry contrive worse than the torment Gavin already put himself through.

"Go, pray" Cullen lowered his voice, but he gazed at Gavin with sympathy. "For the Makers forgiveness, and for the souls of Nella and your child. And if you find it in you...Eldora as well. We will talk in the morning. "

Gavin managed a nod and turned towards the door. Cullen's heart was still beating hard in his chest, as he said, "I cannot give you the punishment you seek. Eldora acted on her own accord, and that had little to do with you."

"Sir, I...what do you do when they are gone?"

Cullen swallowed, the rumors still made their way around the gallows. Well, they weren't rumors if they were true, but he and Meredith worked very hard to keep them that way. What was the point of hiding his secret anymore? The boy probably felt some sense of comradeship, a sense that Cullen knew something about loss. If he could help him then why hide.

"...The hardest part about surviving where others died is the living, and the hardest part about losing someone you...you love is the learning you're still alive."


	2. Chapter 2

***Part of my Jan 1st-15th challenge***

Chap 2 Why do you torment me?

The room smelled of stale ale and overly sweet mead mixed with fragrant perfumes that choked his throat. It almost reminded him of the Blooming Rose, but it was just a normal tavern that so happened to have a few high class whores, or maybe whorish noble women. It was always hard to tell. A four days journey from Kirkwall, and he hadn't the nerve to bring a surplus of lyrium, and possessed only enough for the journey home. Nervousness almost compelled him to drink some then and there, but he had not fallen so low. However, his stomach continued to do horrific back flips against every attempt to steady his nerves. Cullen did not know why he went there, nor why he sent Surana that letter in the first place. More so he didn't know why he couldn't stand to think her name, the same name she had insisted he use years ago. It was the name that still haunted his dreams in both lust and sorrow. Some nights he awoke from his feverish dreams, wondering if she had come to him in the Fade. He wouldn't ask her that when she got to the tavern, but part of him wanted to.

Cullen had heard the rumors of her, Darlteness Surana, the Hero of Ferelden, and Warden-Commander. No one in that tavern knew that he had been in love with the most powerful elf in Thedas, perhaps even the most powerful mage. Gossip said she had become the lover of Maric's bastard son, and that Anora so respected her that the queen promised if she ever retired that she would be granted a title and remain arlessa of Amaranthine. Her descendents would inherit the land. Meredith went on a rant about it years ago, but nothing had come of it. The nobles wouldn't let any elf get that successful, and certainly no mage. They'd only bend the rules so far. It was the only rumor he knew he could take as fact. Other rumors spouted that she fought a talking darkspawn and had secretly slaughtered forty men blind folded with only a spoon and a broken arm. Exaggerations swallowed the truth all too easily.

Well he could ask about those things soon enough. A barmaid set a mug down on the table, snapping him from his thoughts. He looked up at her bright green eyes and coy smile. She was a pretty thing with curves to make most men of the chantry renounce their vows. To her misfortune, however, she lacked the subtly of a cat waiting to pounce, and resembled a vulture waiting to feast.

"This is on me, sweetie. Handsome man like you though shouldn't be drinking alone."

"Uh...I am waiting for someone."

"Oh...a lucky girl then." The disappointment on her face turned into a amusement, and that only made Cullen shift in his seat "Still, you look like you need it."

_Oh Maker, don't tell me I look that nervous_?

When the barmaid moved from the table, Cullen's heart stopped and his mouth became as dry was the northern wastelands. Surana stood there before him, her face lit up like a beacon and her eyes as golden as ever. The dark skinned elf watched him, not moving a muscle, and he was certain they were both noting the differences. She had barely changed at all. Her white hair was in almost the same style save for two braids adorned with beads framing her round cheeks and pointed chin. She still painted herself in make-up, but the purple lipsticks of her past had become a dark red. She wore royal blue robes with the Grey Warden emblem embroidered above her right breast, and she moved with complete and utter confidence.

He was wrong she had changed, she had matured into the stunning woman he had sensed she was. Not that she was any less before, but as she walked towards his table she was all his dreams and more. Part of him felt ill.

"Cullen." Her velvety voice made his face grow hot, as he stood. He forgot how much taller he was, but even as he stood over her, her presence made him feel small. "It has been so long."

_Should I bow, shake her hand? Bloody hell should I touch her at all_?

As if sensing his hesitation, she took his hands in hers and held them. The joy in her eyes was evident, but subdued. _Does she think I'll turn her away_?

"It has, please sit." He pulled out her chair, and the sudden awareness of side eyed glances in their direction took over. It only made him blush harder. He chose this tavern because it was discreet, travelers came and went, particularly templars. Yet a warden could cause a stir anywhere it seemed. He cleared his throat and sat across from her.

"You look well Cullen. I'm glad to see the order has been kind to you."

_No. Stop lying_.

She didn't have to placate him. She could see the dark rings beneath his eyes just like he could. The wear and tear of his life was evident with each wrinkle. If you followed them you'd see every betrayal he'd suffered. None of them lead to her, but they had lead to almost every other important person in his life.

He forced a chuckle. "D-don't feel the need to flatter me. You on the other hand look..r-ravishing." Cullen could have curled up into himself. His nervous stutter would show up around her. Well it wasn't quite a stutter, more like a bad habit, or so he had told her long ago. After nearly a decade of it being gone, it reappeared like the blight. He cleared his throat again an let out a deep breath.

"Well, thank you."

For a moment her eyes darkened as if she couldn't see any truth in his words. Part of Cullen screamed to reassure her, but he silenced it with a sip of his ale.

"I was rather surprised that you wrote me. I heard about everything in Kirkwall, and I wrote to Knight-Commander Stannard before telling her if she ever needed my _personal aid_ I could assist quietly. And I thought it best not to contact the first enchanter directly." As confusion crossed over his face she looked down at her hands. "The Wardens were not pleased about my involvement in Ferelden politics, regardless of the special circumstances. I could not act directly either way, but she wrote back that I should keep my business in Ferelden."

"I apologize on her behalf. She was not in her right mind."

"So I hear." She spoke in a tone he had never heard before, as if her words held some double meaning. Cullen sat straight in his seat, tilting his head. "There is interest in this supposed "red lyrium"."

"Within the wardens?"

"Well not exactly. I am still a mage, Cullen. I keep up with the Circle where I can, but that's neither here nor there." The urge to probe her further halted the moment he looked in her eyes. They could hold secrets he beyond imagination, but he'd never know. The one thing he knew would never change was that she would never tell anyone something she didn't want to. "Enough of that, how are things going there?"

"Rough to say the least. The new crown-prince of Starkhaven was originally training to be a brother under the revered mother, and he is demanding retribution where he can find it."

"I had heard rumors of such things. He traveled with Lady Hawke, as I understand."

Lady? Hawke was unmarried, and currently was no more than a fugitive to most of the world. The way Surana said her name held such unnatural familiarity...Part of Cullen wanted to laugh at himself for thinking about their past. Surana had only come to know the internals of Kirkwall. She had severed their past just as easily as he tried to.

"You know her?" The severity of his tone earned him only a raised brow.

"Not exactly. I know of her, and had the opportunity to meet her once. I know more of some of her companions. The apostate that blew up the Chantry..." Surana shut her eyes a moment then leaned back in her seat. He had seen her do that a dozen times during her lessons in the library or when playing chess. Her relaxed posture could either mean something wonderful or something horrid. She did the same thing when she won a game as when she accidently killed another apprentice's pet rat.

"Aye?"

"I am the one who made him a warden. The templars wanted him dead after the darkspawn attack on Vigil's Keep, and said he had killed his templar jailors."

Rage boiled Cullen's blood into fire, but he kept himself from jumping to his feet. He drew in a slow breath, struggling against every instinct to remain calm. If she hadn't spared him years ago then hundreds of people would still be alive.

"Why in Maker's name would you-"

"I needed recruits, and I don't take the words of templars as law. They weren't even there, so I chose not to believe their bias. I" Her eyes were as cold as ice, and her voice held not an ounce of affectation. She wouldn't let him know if he got to her at all. She may have defeated an archdemon, but if he drained her magic- "If I did that how many Ferelden mages would be dead. "

He stood up, leaning over the table as every muscle tensed with anger. How he wanted to covet her soul, to protect her as she was, and yet how he wanted to tear her asunder.

"That's uncalled for!"

She stared at him for what felt like an eternity before easing back in her chair and lowering her eyes.

"I know, I'm sorry. I didn't mean...Cullen, Anders was...a good man once. There was no way to prove he in any way hurt those templars purposefully. They were partially scorched after we fought darkspawn, who had forced him out of his cell and seemingly slain his jailors. I don't know what happened to him." Her pleading eyes struck him down faster than a sword or mace, and he found himself sitting again. "Can we do this over?"

Cullen ran his fingers through his thick curls. He had imagined meeting her time and time again, ruining it now wasn't an option.

"Y-yes."

"I have missed you Cullen. You were always so kind to me...to the other mages. Irving said you had a heart of gold."

Cullen found himself smiling, as the memories flooded his mind.

"The old man was a softy if there ever was one, just like Gregoir."

"Oh yes, he'd have this trader bring some of the younger mages these Antivan candies. Once Jowan and I-" Surana began to chuckle as the memory clouded her beautiful eyes. "we...broke into his office and ate so many I got sick all over Irvings robe when he found us. He looked at me and just said "Well, you won't eat any more of those will you?" And I, oh Maker I was awful, I grabbed one more candy and ate it right there just to spite him. It didn't even get half way down," Cullen found himself laughing with her, and for the first time in a long time his shoulders felt less heavy. "He just stared me down, trying not to laugh as I said "I guess I won't be.""

"You were a uh t-trouble maker."

She laughed and motioned for the barmaid to bring her ale. Surana turned to him with a smirk

"Ha, I was rather good." The barmaid put a mug down in front of her, and Surana handed her two sovereigns like it was nothing. She must have been doing very well for herself. "I just had a smart mouth."

"Y-you certainly caused me plenty of trouble." Even with his stutter Cullen could hear how that sounded. He shouldn't have said anything at all. She must have thought him a sentimental fool, or think that he only wrote her because of some stupid emotion. Yet she only looked at him, her full cheeks turning rosy with an expression like someone just serenaded her.

"Did I really?"

Cullen stared down at his drink, wrapping both hands around the mug.

"Umm...well...you...did make me run off that time."

Surana's lips curled into a small smirk, but her eyes looked half innocent. Years ago, Gregoir chastised him for staring at that smile, for trying to get shifts just so he might see her. Beautiful was the first thing he ever thought when he saw her. He had heard gossip back then claiming she had never even kissed a boy, and that was odd amongst the mages. Someone said it was because she was elven, and Cullen almost interrupted them laughing because any man who did not see what he saw was insane.

"I honestly did not mean to and I did want to get to know you better." Her shoulders slumped and she rested her chin in her hand. "I really liked you. I...well I guess that was obvious."

He knew she had noticed him, but he didn't think it was enough to provoke the sadness in her eyes. The last time he saw her he had been...traumatized. Cullen winced, recalling how his brothers screams echoed in those cavernous halls as they were corrupted. The older templars went without lyrium for days, and by the end most were begging the demon for relief. The demon would beam at them with her ravenous eyes, and when he alone stood she would take Surana's face. It didn't smell like her, and it didn't taste like her, but how he wanted to give in. His feelings were a sin, a folly of the greatest kind. He had learned that the hard way, but as she sat there all he wanted was to rewind the clock. 'Wait for me after you're done with the archdemon,' he'd say. Nothing could change what had occurred.

"...Surana..."

"Darla, I told you then, and I'm telling you now call me by my name." Only she could combine a plea and a demand into one. "I'm sure you called me here to do more than reminisce."

Truth be told he didn't know exactly what he was looking for by writing her at all. He could have written anyone in the order or the Circle, but he needed someone he could rely on, or so he told himself. "Be honest with me, you are on the outside of this as a warden and have traveled half of Thedas. Are things as bad as they seem, or is it just Kirkwall?"

A dry laugh rattled through her in a huff then she knocked back her mug. She held it in her hand swirling the brown liquid within before setting it down.

"They are as bad as they seem."

The sense of dread that had become his constant companion crept over him. She didn't mix words. If anyone wanted the facts she'd tell them the hard truth with very little padding. One moment she could be as vulnerable as she was in the tower, but the next she'd be like a descending mace. Maybe that's what made him fall for her in the first place.

His eyes narrowed and he stared off into the distance. She need not say what kind of war it would be, rumbles of it had been making their way through the city for months. Kirkwall could not withstand a war, the guards had only recently reached the number they were before the destruction of the Chantry. The city would be near...defenseless if the Templars were summoned elsewhere.

"I see. I had feared as much."

"War will be coming soon. The Divine is concerned from what I hear."

"And how would you hear?"

"Friends in high places." She leaned forward, glancing away as she took a swig of her ale. "How bad are things for you?"

"Some of my men are calling for a return to Meredith's tactics. We've had to limit the number of tranquil allowed around the city. Five of them were killed by a violent mob a month ago, and the mages are beginning to resist our authority. There's more escapees every month, and as a result more mage deaths."

"Why is that? It can't all be because of Anders stupid acts."

"We lost a lot of good men when the right was evoked and the Chantry destroyed. More extreme factions have been rising on both sides." There were few options in solving the problems of the city, and they inadvertently fell to him in the chaos. Over the years his stance on mages had softened, as compared to when he left the tower, but he could never be as soft as Gregoir. The circumstance didn't allow for it, and —as much as Cullen considered him a father figure— after Uldred, Cullen could see Gregoir was weak. Templars could become monsters too, but none could be as deadly as mages. "When I return I fear disbanding the Kirkwall fraternities may be in order."

"What?" She leaned forward. "Cullen, that would only make things worse. The fraternities are the only illusion of freedom mages really have. If you hope to stop mage unrest then don't strip them of that."

"And what else shall I do? Many of the fraternities are calling for the Divine to reexamine how mages are treated. The people fear the Free Marches will become another Tevinter, and far too many of my men believe that I should be Meredith and call upon the right of annulment because the deaths must be avenged."

Vengeance or justice none of it lead anywhere, but so few understood that. It was one man who violated the sanctity of the Chantry, and that man's death would come soon enough. So many of his men did not see the truth.

The burden on his shoulders was dragging him down. Mages were dangerous, but the fact remained Meredith and plenty of Templars had driven mages like Eldora to death and others to blood magic. Thrask had seen it, but Cullen had been blind. Thrask had pulled Cullen aside one day, saying that "Meredith is so wrapped up in invisible enemies and accusations, she cannot see the abuses, nor the enemies she makes for us all," but Cullen dismissed him as being too soft on the mages. If they didn't turn to blood magic then she wouldn't make accusations. At least, back then it had been so simple. After Thrask's death and Meredith's petrifaction, he couldn't deny the number of complaints he found when cleaning Meredith's desk— Mages who had been beaten without provocation, others who had been degraded, letters from Senior Enchanters stating that rumors circulated that certain templars had been abusing the tranquil. Too many templars ignored their duty to the Maker and to their charges, and he had respected Meredith too much to see she was one of them.

In his pack, tucked in the pages of his journal he kept two letters as a reminder of what he ignored. The words he could recite in his sleep as easily as he could recall his friends cries of pain as Uldred ripped them apart.

_Please Knight-Commander my mum is sick. She doesn't have long to live and I only want to write her a few letters before she passes to the Maker's side. I can understand not allowing me to see her, but I am not like so many here. My mother had me until I was ten summers old, and she lost my father soon after I was sent to the gallows. Please let me at least write her. Let her know I love her before she's gone._

_ - Heralt_

_Heralt, _

_ I am sorry your mother is dying, but for the tenth time I must deny this request. Your mother's resistance to handing you over to the templars along with your ill-advised friendships gives me pause. Rumors of your support of the libertarians in conjunction with your previous friendship with apprentice Evelina have lead me to believe you present a threat to the citizens of this city. Your zealotry in pursuing this matter only strengthens my belief, though I hope it is otherwise. Until further notice I am informing the First Enchanter that you are denied access to the courtyard and dining hall under all circumstances._

Heralt died in the Gallows, with Meredith's tainted sword through his belly like so many others. Cullen could still recall how Heralt's mother broke down in the doorway of her hovel. The anger emblazoned on Heralt's brothers face as he threatened them, after Cullen revealed that in the end Heralt never used blood magic, remained in his mind. He told himself they could all be Uldred, but he didn't see that so could Meredith.

"Are you still with me Cullen?" Surana's, no, Darla's voice pulled him back from his thoughts.

"Ah y-yes I am. Sorry just drifted off for a moment."

"It's ok" He realized her soft fingers were on top of his hand—well he imagined they were soft because he could imagine them any other way— and he pulled his gauntlet covered hand back. He fought against the rising heat in his body, and cleared his throat once more. "May I ask you something?" When Cullen nodded, she sat up straight, swallowing and looking elsewhere. The right words for her question eluded her, which meant that nothing good could be coming. "Do you ever wish we could go back, and do things over?"

Cullen looked down, focusing squarely on his drink. She treaded into dangerous territory, and it was bad enough his palms were stinging with sweat. After all those years she still gave him the jitters, and her eyes still set his heart in his throat. "H-How do you mean?"

"I miss the days before things were complicated. Sometimes I wish the Fifth Blight never happened. Do not think I do not love my life, I do. I have a good man and good friends, but before things were so easy."His heart fell into the pit of his stomach, and he peaked up at her a moment before shutting his eyes. Darla did have someone, of course she would. No one would pass her up, except a fool like him. "I don't know why I'm asking. Look at you, you have a good position and I'm sure women are throwing themselves at you."

At that Cullen let out a hollow laugh, and drank down the last of his ale.

"Not many women become enamored with lyrium addled templars, except whores and the naive." There were pretty virtuous women, who found his position and his faith alluring. A few of them he spoke to in the Chantry with nothing more than friendliness, but he quickly realized his innocent intentions were easily misread. It wasn't that he hadn't thought about trying, but the life of a templar could be difficult. Few women were willing to deal with the cruelties it could bring, and fewer templars were willing to bring that upon them. Besides against his desires he still longed for her after all that time. She was a sickness to his soul, and he just could not shake it. With a heavy sigh he glanced at Darla, hesitation clawed at his mind. _There can be no harm in this. She already knows_. "There was someone...once."

"Oh?"

"Y-Yes...a woman who could make me sweat like no other. Sh-she never left my thoughts."

_ What am I doing_?

Darla went quiet, crossing her ankles, and rubbing the backs of her hands in that way that always said she was speechless. He didn't mean to make her eyes sad again, but they were.

"Even though she was a dirty mage..."

"I never said-"

"You might as well have. I saw how you looked at me." Her voice carried a horrific mourning to it, as if she bemoaned the loss of one more thing from her past. Maybe that wasn't far from the truth. "I never forgot the revulsion in your eyes, as if I was the one that put you in that cage. Jowan betrayed me, my few other friends there died by Uldred's hand, and you thought I was a monster. Before you never had an unkind word, and always listened when I went on rants about my studies. You treated me like I was...not just a mage, like I was a lady."

_'You are a mage and I, a templar. It is my duty to oppose you and all you are_.' The memory of his words felt like acid burning the back of his throat and mind. The Chantry taught him that they were right, to see mages as less human, and as Meredith liked to say "cursed". However, the Chantry seemed so empty now. Elthina for all her wisdom fell to the same arrogance as everyone else, and ignored the madness of the Knight-Commander, thinking the Maker would protect her from frightened angry mages. Why should she be any different than his brothers-in-arms— Karlston, Neirin, Shior, John— when in the eyes of the Maker they were all mortals trying to earn his favor? His faith in the Maker was strong, but the line between what he believed and what he saw had become thick. Darla had assured her place at the Maker's side a dozen times over, and still Cullen, in his agony, cast aside her friendship, and that unspoken thing that never stopped burning in his soul.

She wasn't perfect by any means. She always complained about her duties when she couldn't do them on her own time. She almost started a fight with Sister Gwyn and Keili when she defiantly recited the Canticles of Shartan during a Feast Day celebration, and proudly declared herself heretic. Worse yet, she had no respect for authority and would blindly put her faith in people like Jowan or that bastard apostate.

None of that really mattered in the long run. As angry as he had been moments before, and as much as it troubled him, he knew she couldn't have known Anders depravity. Cullen knew he must put faith in the Maker and in the Chantry without question. Years ago he first asked why the only thing that had mattered had been that she was a mage, but he had seen the work of mages. All it took was a second to remember the horrors of the Tower to answer his question. He had been tormented by their accursed magic in ways that haunted his dreams far more than she. Yet that same question returned to haunt him.

In the end all that did matter was that she was mage and he a templar. He'd had lived a good dutiful life and obeyed his oath even when his heart betrayed him. He had prayed and repented when he injured those mages at the tower, and the Maker knew his shame. Yet betrayal after betrayal came from all sides, not just from within, and the regret at never telling her the depths of his feelings plagued him. Out of everyone she had been good, and acted justly so far as he knew.

As he watched Darla's eyes begin to water, for the first time she looked away from him with such unrelenting shame that his insides turned to ice.

"I am sorry...things have just been...stressful lately. I am sure you've heard about Irving..."

Cullen's eyes fell again, and a pang of pain coursed through his chest. "Yes, I am sorry. "

"I was on my way to say goodbye, but I was a day late. I hadn't seen him in years, but we wrote often. He took a special interest in Jowan and I...some of the others hated us for it."

"There were rumors he knew of Jowan's father and mother."

"Really?"

Cullen put on a modest smile, swallowing as he reached for her hand. There could be no romantic overtures, he was simply a friend even if touching her thrilled him like he was the same naive boy she had cared for."Well there were also rumors that he fathered you with a Dalish woman."

Through her tears came loud hearty laughter, and Cullen's smile became genuine. Their entire time together had been dizzying. One moment they were laughing, and the next they could probably punch each other. Well, she could punch him, and he'd probably let it happen. Inside his heart a war against his sense raged. _I may never see her again_. The life of a warden was full of danger, and the growing hostility towards mages may not spare their ranks. Fate had brought them together why should he let things fester. His life was full of false triumphs like survival, or failures like trusting Meredith because he had to believe in someone after Greagoir refused to act. Denying himself the chance to air the things that haunted his dreams would be another failure, another deep regret.

"When I was in the tower during the uprising. I watched good men die or be turned into abominations. I resisted as hard as I could. It took her hours before she got deep enough in my head. "

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to."

After the things he said and the way she felt, she still put him before herself. A delicious warmth rose in his chest, and despite himself a smile threatened the corners of his mouth.

"No...it's alright." Cullen looked down, realizing he hadn't moved his hand. He looked away inhaling deep, before turning back to her. "I just want you to understand."


	3. Chapter 3

Chap 3 A Festering Wound

_And so is the Golden City blackened_

_With each step you take in my Hall._

The odor of rotten meat and death had seeped into Cullen's skin and smothered his soul. The demon reveled in it, and with each fallen comrade it let out a cry of ecstasy that rattled his bones. Only Cullen remained, but each blood curdling scream and splatter of blood weakened his resolve.

_How long can this go on_?

"I can smell it— something, something, something...someone...oh, yes, little templar. Resist. I love the way you fight. " The demon touched between her legs, as twisted joy lit up her face. The wickedness in her laughter matched her face's unnatural symmetry, her false perfection. She was no more real than a child's doll, and equally as soulless. It was a demon, not a she, not an anything, but a beast. What he'd give to run her through with the malificarum that summoned her.

The abominations feasted on his torment with wide gawking grins, as his friends fell to demonic influence or died one by one. They had left the demon to finish their work and joined Uldred hours ago. They and their demons had slaughtered many children, but some were corrupt, just as they were. Their innocent souls filled with greed, and their eyes shining with impish playfulness like some foul creation the Maker forsook. A little girl amongst them had pointed, and cackled at Cullen with glee as if his torture were a puppet show.

They weren't people. They weren't human. No mage was, not even...Cullen pressed the thought down deep, but the image of Darla Surana flickered in his mind for a brief moment. Any weakness was food for desire, and he needed to be strong.

"_Blessed are they who stand before the corrupt and the wicked and do not falter..." _

"Little templar...yes I see her! Oh how you crave her...in your bed and in your life. And I see her...such a lovely form..._such a lovely voice_." With the last four words the monster's voice changed into the silken sound that had always made him quiver. He swallowed reciting the Chant beneath his breath. She knew nothing of that mage, that woman who had risked everything for a stupid friend. Cullen buried memories of Darla further, beneath thoughts of Andraste opposing the magisters. He strove for imitating Andraste's iron clad will upon her death. Cullen could almost imagine her with her flowing hair, with a smile as defiant as Darla's. A dull ache began to drum inside his skull, and faint wisps of magic began to fill his throat. "You wanted her...you wanted me. Almost every night in your bed you'd stroke...and touch. I'd do the same you know, touch and think of you."

""_Blessed are they-"_

"You saw my looks, how I found any excuse to talk to you even when we both knew better." Each word lingered on, as if she savored the extent of his turmoil. It need not recount the shameful thoughts that plagued his waking hours, and consumed his time in the Church, praying for forgiveness. His skin crawled and his innards turned even as his heart betrayed him in its speed. It wasn't Darla, but it had her voice. "You'd watch me walk by and think "She's curvy for an elf," and then you'd imagine my lips on yours, and wonder how I'd sound crying out your name."

"_Blessed are the peacekeepers, the champions of the just_." The demon was beyond the cage, but it felt as if she was beside him, luring him in. He could feel the beasts breath roll over his neck, and he shivered. She was outside the cage it was only an illusion, but it felt so real.

"So many pretty girls in the tower and on the shore, but you only noticed one, me. Did you ever realize how much my body yearned to know yours?"

Without warning a warm hand touched his chest, startling him. He grabbed the hand as his eyes snapped open, preparing to unsheath his sword, but he saw Darla looking startled and the wood of the bunk above his own. Darla looked taken aback, and he withdrew his hand from her as if she were on fire.

"Whoa I-I only came to wake you."

"Wh-what?"

"You've been asleep half the day. I noticed you weren't in service or out training this afternoon. So I snuck in here." Darla bothered to learn his schedule. He'd have been a fool not to suspect as much, but he wasn't too arrogant to pretend that it couldn't be coincidence he had been seeing her so often. Her cheeks went red and she began to avoid eye contact. "I-I was worried."

Though adrenaline rushed through him everything else appeared perfectly calm. No mountains of flesh like taint covered the corners, and the air smelled of faint magic mixed with mustiness. The beds were made, and the furniture stood exactly where they were supposed to be. Nothing was amiss. Had it all been a horrible nightmare? Had some mage with a vendetta touched his mind in the Fade? _Wait, she was worried, about me_?

Cullen sat up, running his fingers through his hair. Hours (or was it days?) ago he kept asking himself if she cared for him beyond being a familiar face."Why were you worried?" As soon as the words were said Cullen wished to take them back. A very insistent part of him wanted to hear her response, but the other reminded him of their positions. The distance between guessing at each other's emotions, and knowing them was vast. It was also the difference between safety and danger, a fact reinforced by the contents of his stomach lurching in nervous defiance.

"Oh...well uh. I didn't see you that's all." She crossed her arms and turned her back to him, instigating a dragged out silence that did nothing to quiet his nerves. Darla glanced over her shoulder with eyes lined with caution . "It's strange...you're always prompt, and I always see you during service...and well...I only really go because of you."

A lump caught in his throat, and his mouth became a dessert "W-why is that?"

"You know why." Her words were as blunt as ever, as gave the unusually empty room a lengthy once over. Cullen did know why, or more so he hoped he did. He had noticed her sidelong glances and coy smiles that spoke beyond innocent intentions, but he could have been mistaken and part of him hoped he was. If not than others may have noticed as well, and that could spell disaster. The position they were in alone could spell disaster, with her at the edge of his bed rubbing the backs of her hands with uneasiness written all over her face. She shouldn't have even been on that floor, and definitely not sitting on his bed. Cullen looked down to his lap, searching for the right words to get her to leave before someone saw, for her own sake if not his.

When he looked back she leaned in, leaving little between their lips, but the heat of their breath. The intimacy put him at a standstill and the world stopped with him. He wanted to touch her, to ravish her, and make his nightly fantasy into a sinful reality. The need in her eyes called out to him, begging him to give into what they both wanted. Cullen choked down his shock, but his fight against his arousal was a losing one. He wore no shirt to bed, and for all intents and purposes that was the most naked he'd ever been in her presence. That alone got his blood pumping and sent his mind spinning. Excitement coursed through him, sending all the blood to the one place he prayed it wouldn't. If the Maker and Andraste watched over him then she wouldn't noticed. "I...the things I feel for you would make a sister of the chantry blush."

Darla's eyes fell downward, and Cullen's mind raced into a panic. So long as he never insinuated anything he could deny it, but for her to actually see what she did to him was unthinkable, not to mention embarrassing. Templars were supposed to be epitomes of courtesy and morality, while many of his brethren did not believe that he did. A decent man treated a lady, even if she were a mage, like a lady at all times, and his body was intent on proving him indecent.

Cullen began to speak, to come up with some haphazard reason and apologize for his body's rebellion against him, but Darla only met his eyes with an unspoken invitation. With a shrug of her shoulders the right sleeve of Darla's robe slid down her shoulder exposing her shoulder with half of her chest, and knocking the air from Cullen's lungs. _Oh sweet Andraste's knickers what is she doing_? With trembling fingers she pulled down her other sleeve, leaving her breasts bare before him. With a small gasp he tried to avert his eyes, but his desire kept them focused.

In the templar quarters they could be seen, but for some reason that only made his blood pump harder. Her cheeks were bright red, as she pressed her lips against him. She threw her arms around his neck, as her tongue slid into his mouth. It was as if she wanted to consume him whole. It wouldn't be enough for him. _I could lose my position...my home...all for her, but why does this feel so nice._ She clung to him for life, and it made his heart flutter even as he screamed in his head. Heaven was in her arms, after all his doubts and fear, she felt the same about him. As he began to slide his hands around her he tried to memorize every aspect of that moment from each caress to the smell of her hair and the softness of her skin. He yearned to know and remember that heaven for as long as he breathed.

However, trying to record the memory caused unease to set into his mind. All the little details were off. Darla's normally soft eyes were filled with lust and hunger alone. Not the hunger of a needy heart, but the hunger of a glutton waiting to gorge herself on mutton and wine. Cullen wanted her, but he wasn't the sort of man just interested in panting and moaning. He wanted Darla because she was herself. The Darla he knew had so much more to her then raw yearning. The real Darla's eyes were lit with her strange brand of mischievous sarcasm that made her seem like a giant amongst men. At the same time, the words from those soft lips of hers were everything he'd expect if she ever found the courage, but Darla lacked the nature to be that forward physically. Darla could flirt and she had a mouth, but he knew her well enough to know that actual sex would make her nerves take over.

Once he overheard apprentice Teresa joke that Darla should just "have a lay with Jowan and stop holding out". Darla choked on her drink, her eyes grew to the size of dinner plates, and her cheeks lightened past compare. Actual _sexual_ things dissolved her defenses in the wake of her own secret shyness and anxiety. For some reason he had always liked that about her, and the creature before him lacked that kind of depth all together.

Beyond that she smelled of molten magic and sour lyrium, not of apples or sweet vanilla. Rage boiled within his belly, ceasing the little flips of happiness that had begun within. The "reality" was another part of the nightmare. The tower lay in shambles, and everything he saw was a bitter lie. Cullen sneered, and dug his fingers into her arms, throwing her down to the floor.

"Be gone demon!"

"Cullen what are you-"

"I will not falter. I will stay strong. Cease this pathetic illusion."

A cruel smirk erupted on the creature's stolen face, and her brow furrowed, creating caverns of disdain across her forehead. Horns spun out from the crown of her head like sprouting weeds. Her stolen golden eyes became a sickly bright ichor punctuated by black snake slits. As quickly as it appeared the illusion vanished, and he was back kneeling in prayer. The demon lay before him, as Darla had moments before, and he began to curse his ill-begotten lust for her. True fortitude of spirit meant not giving into longing. The demon would not be granted that satisfaction. He'd sooner die.

"Oh...little templar...such a romantic. So few like you in this world."

Cullen could not tell what disturbed him more, the way the corner of her mouth twitched in annoyance, or the way she spoke with such admiration.

"_Blessed are the righteous, the lights in the shadow_."

"How righteous are you templar that you feel such desire in your heart?" The demon approached him, and kneeled. Cullen remained still, refusing to acknowledge her existence further. Tiredness kept him from engaging her in a fair fight, but so long as she wished to play her twisted game he would live. He swore that his strength wouldn't waver, not just for him but for every templar that had fallen to the mages' perversion. The demon would grow cocky. They always did.

"When you heard about Ostagar, about how the grey had fallen you almost cried for her, but you couldn't. Templars can't love mages. Templars can't allow themselves to grow attached."

The urge to wretch began to set in. Cullen shut his eyes, letting the feeling of shame underscore his desire to live. Her words held too much truth, and even as he tried to ignore it the sense of unfairness remained. He could not mourn, and he could not confide in anyone except the Maker. That woman had made him a mockery of what he aspired to. His feelings were nothing but a testament to his own failings.

"It's sad really. Understand that demons can feel empathy that is why we wish to help. We wish to give you all you long for because the world is unfair. Little Templar...did you ever shed a tear for what may have been?"

Images began to flow through his mind with a sharp throbbing pain. His body ached as if he had been tossed from one end of the tower to the next. Everything was spinning, even as his eyes shut. He remembered how during an argument Darla ran up to him with Jowan and Teresa trailing behind.

"Maybe you can settle this." Cullen sucked in his cheeks slightly, trying to fend off the growing heat in his face, as he looked down at Darla. "Eva and Karl said that people judge elves differently than humans, but by any standard they said my eyes were too far apart and my nose snubbish. Is that true?"  
Cullen hadn't seen that one coming, and it sent his stomach churning. _Why would she ask me this_? If Geagoir overheard them it'd be unthinkable.

"Uh...umm."

"Well?"

"Your... uh." He swallowed, but his throat was dry and tight. _I can't be honest, but I shouldn't really lie. If I say too much everyone will know, and she'll laugh, and... Oh Maker I am going to make a fool of myself aren't I_? "Th-they...your n-nose um. Th-this isn't really appropriate-"

"Oh, be honest, man. I won't take offense. Maybe. Somewhat. Just be honest-"

"Your...your eyes are a little too far apart ." The words tumbled out of him, and everything sane within him begged to crawl into a hole.

Darla crossed her arms leaning back, with a skeptical glint in her eye. "Oh?" Jowan bit his bottom lip, stifling his laughter, while Teresa giggled into her hand. This was the crucible, and he was going to burn. "Don't stop now, go on?"

"A-and...your n-nose isn't...s-snub, it's sorta narrow and then t-turns up a little at the end." Cullen put his hands behind his back, hiding their shaking from view. He never really thought about how much time he spent staring at her to notice such things. He stood still as a statue of Andraste, however, he certainly was sweating more than she ever did, even on the pyre. Yet Darla only nodded, staring him down with a bemused expression that he couldn't fully read. "I guess...well...some um...people they say your cheeks are a little too uh round for your chin, but-" He lowered his eyes, staring down at his feet. If only he could melt into the floor.

"What? You agree?"

"N-no. I think...well, my o-opinion doesn't matter, but...you are f-fine as you are. You're an attractive lady, and if others do not see that then...they are blind. J-just observation nothing m-more."

Teresa stared at Cullen, as if the brunette could read his thoughts. Her expression shifted from stunned to critical before settling on amused. Jowan's brows were raised in a mixture of concern and astonishment that made Cullen swallow despite his mouths dryness. Jowan always seemed like a wheel, waiting to turn from one emotion to the next. The emotion he turned to with Cullen from that day forth became bemused caution. They knew his secret even if no one else did.

Those two didn't matter though, what mattered was the way Darla stared at him with her mouth agape. The four were silent, but the sound of clinking armor approaching caught their attention, and Jowan cleared his throat.

"Um, we should get to our primal arts lesson," Jowan said, tugging on Darla's sleeve.

"Oh, right...yes. Well." She looked around a moment, rubbing her chin as she faced away from him as though trying to hide the unsure smile on her lips. She looked back at him, and grinned. "Thank you for your honesty."

A wave of magic flowed over Cullen's skin dragging him from the memory into something else. A sour tune began to weave into his mind, and for a second intoxicated him before vanishing. He was suddenly in Greagoir's office, and he knew why he was there. The Knight-Commander had heard the rumors of Cullen's crush, and seen the way he looked at Darla. Greagoir stared at him without blinking, his eyes dissecting every inch of Cullen.

"Sir, I...I know what this is about I-"

"You are...infatuated with apprentice Surana." Greagoir waited for a response, but as Cullen looked into his mentor's eyes shame forced him to look elsewhere. "It is...normal for a young man to feel a certain way about a young lady or even other young men. It has happened to the best of us Cullen, but your duty is to the Maker. Surana is a good mage, and a good, if stubborn, person. But there is a line-"

"Sir, I have...never acted on my feelings towards her, I assure you. I respect the line between templars and mages."

"I believe you, lad. I do, but I must ask. What if the rules were to change?"

Cullen's brain swirled in dizziness, and he could swear he had been fighting something just moments before. Yet moments before he was talking to Darla, or was he remembering? _Blast, something isn't right._

"Sir I feel ill-"

"That's just nerves, but...I should inform you of a recent decision brought about by the Divine. In a year's time we will be granting certain mages who have passed their Harrowing...certain freedoms."

Cullen rubbed his temples, trying to focus on the Knight-Commander's words. The room blurred, and Greagoir's words alternated between perfect clarity and muffled.

"Ugh, sorry I-I'm not sure I follow..."

"Irving has utmost faith in Darlteness Surana, with my vote of confidence, and if she passes her Harrowing. She may be allowed to leave the circle if she so chooses."

Cullen stared at him, wondering if he was playing some cruel joke, or if he had downed some bad lyrium earlier. That couldn't be right because it had never happened. He had wished for it, time and time again, but mages were dangerous. He knew that with a burning passion they had hurt Shior and John and...but they were alive and fine. _It can't be. This is a lie...this is a-_

He stood in front of the alter in the tower, dressed in his finest clothes. Darla had said she loved seeing him in red, the color of his faith, so he had chosen to wear it on their day of marriage. That didn't sound right, but he remembered it clear enough. He had decided not to wear armor, and she had agreed not to wear her robes. They would be a man and a woman joined under the Maker's guidance. She would need a guardian, mages were dangerous, but they needed to be protected. Cullen would always protect her. He had whispered that in her ear the night they first kissed. Yes, he remembered that.

As he stood there before their friends and peers, ignoring his increasing nervousness became difficult. He knew he'd be nervous during the ceremony, but the apprehension he felt bordered on fright. Cullen looked over his shoulder, searching for one reassuring face. Irving stood behind him beside Greagoir, each with small smiles, exchanging knowing looks. On a front bench sat his sister, her eyes still somewhat sunken, but her cheeks had a healthy blush and she seemed happy. He could remember how he convinced her to become a seamstress like their mother, and how a sister of the Chantry helped her find the right path. Yet recalling the details made his blood thump in his ears.

Irving leaned in, patting him on the back. "Do not worry, son. You will be happy with her. The past five years for you two have been so...nice to watch. She is like a daughter to me, and I know you will treat her well."

Cullen tried to speak, but a lump in his throat choked him. He was drenched in sweat, and his heart was about to tear through his chest. This day had been a long time coming. With Shior's help he had built a little house near Lake Calenhad. It'd be enough room for them, and hopefully for children. A light slap to his shoulder caused him to turn towards the entrance. Clad in a simple white gown, and a crown of flowers atop a thin veil, Darla walked towards him, Jowan at her side. She seemed the picture of perfection, almost like a distant specter ripped from the golden city itself. When the two reached Cullen, he gently pulled back her veil with trembling fingers. Jowan unlinked her arm, giving her hand to Cullen with a harsh stare. Cullen understood it perfectly 'You hurt her and I'll find you', but he would never hurt his wife. Together they'd forge a life without sin, a life where neither had to abandon their duties and where things were simple. He had heard Jowan would be marrying a sister of the Chantry in the coming weeks. Maybe that would calm his suspicion towards Cullen.

Hours later the festivities had died down, and the young couple had been rowed across the lake. As the sun set over the horizon their new life was beginning. She had almost screamed when he carried her inside their new home, a home of their own. It was more than either of them could have dreamed. Inside he had showed her the table he built, a room half empty that he hoped would become a nursery to her delight, and finally their bedroom. At the last they both had stood staring inwards at their bed, unsure of what to do. After far too long, Cullen drew in a deep breath, took her hand in his, and lead her toward their bed.

"Cullen, I-I'm so nervous, but I'm...so. Oh Maker you know I'm bad at being open." Darla sat on their bed and he sat beside her. She had such a sweet heart beneath it all. Her innocence never laid in her tongue, but in her honesty. Overtime they'd both become more comfortable, but for the moment Cullen took comfort in taking everything slow. She reached out to him, stroking his cheek. "I...you make me feel...like I'm more than a mage woman, but just...me, a woman, and now I'm your woman, your wife."

He tried to smile, but an ache erupted in the back of his head. Darla's lips seized his in a passionate kiss that rattled his entire system. It still felt so new, but then it was new. Wasn't it?

Darla looked away, leaning back on their bed and raising her wedding dress to her thighs. She took his hand, her smile filled with reassurances that seemed flimsier with the passing seconds. She pulled Cullen on top of her, and the world began to slow down. The skin of her thighs felt so wonderfully soft, and her eyes looked on him with endless fondness.

"Cullen...I want to have your child." Before she could say another word he kissed her again. Besides his position all he ever really wanted was her, and a life. It would be perfect, their child whether mage or mere mortal would know their parents. If they had mage children then Shior and John would look out for them without question. Nothing would trouble them ever again. Life could be simple.

Another pulse of pain over took him, and the image of Shior's eyes rolling back into his skull, as black bile erupted from his mouth clouded Cullen's vision. He remembered Sister Gwyn, yelling to get the children of the tower to the safety of the lower levels before being sent flying by a spell. He couldn't recall what Sister Gwyn had said before their marriage vows, or anything else about the ceremony but strange strung together bits of visions of those supposed five years. They were a dream, like a poorly made child's quilt that felt wonderfully soft, but would keep no one warm. This was a lie.

He couldn't bring himself to move, a strange sound began to echo through his skull, and his uncertainties felt distant from himself. Cullen reached down pulling Darla's dress above her head. There was no reason he couldn't have what he wanted. Why should his love be a sin when Darla was a good woman? His vision was real, it had to be even if it was for one moment. Darla began to kiss from his jaw down his neck. She began to lick and suck on his flesh, causing a low purr to rumble through him with a shiver. Her hands pressed his body against hers, as he pulled down her small clothes. When he touched her womanhood she half yelped in shock. She was a woman of good virtue. She'd never been kissed or anything. He knew that.

Another image roared through his brain, and drove a stake or misery into his heart. Darla turned around to look at him as the Grey Warden lead her out the tower doors. Bags were under her eyes and the sorrow in her dug deep into his soul The night before he found her sobbing in the corner by the stairs. In a moment of abandon he had reached for her, putting a hand on her shoulder. The only time he had ever really touched her without excuse. The only time he had ever dared to cross the line from friendliness to...something else. The lay-sister, Lily, had been hauled away to the dungeons, while Jowan had escaped leaving both her and Darla with the stains of betrayal. Darla had looked at him as if he had been the only sure thing, and it broke her heart to leave him behind. She was a mage, and he was a templar. They could confess nothing of their feelings, or even their friendship. She was a mage and had assisted a blood mage no different from the ones that desecrated their own home, his home. She was a mage, and step away from being a malificarum or an abomination.

"No more, demon!" Cullen grabbed at the false Darla's throat, squeezing until her eyes went wide, and she gasped for breath. She choked out for him to stop, but he squeezed harder and harder. Hot tears were running down his cheeks, but stopping meant giving in. Cullen would never give in. She pounded her fists against him weakly, and tried to push him off as she gasped. False memories began to flood his mind, beating against his will. He saw Darla standing at the door to their home, heavily with child, as he returned from felling some foul abomination. He recalled holding his little girl up in the air, as a high pitched squeal of happiness left her little innocent body. Her name was Merlis, and she had her mother's eyes with his dirty blonde curls. By the time Merlis was a teenager she had three brothers and two twin sisters whose mischievous nature threatened to drive Cullen to madness. Darla would say "They're just like me at that age," whenever they were in trouble, and then he'd say "Well you were a terror then, love."

It would always make her laugh, and he'd laugh right there with her. Every week Greagoir would join them for supper, and sometimes Jowan and his wife would. Teresa, with her pretty eyes and teacher's voice would drop in to tell him how stunning a mage Merlis turned out to be. Shior would inform him whenever a new boy took a shining to Merlis in the tower, so Cullen knew just who needed a...sit down. For a family man his memories held the perfect dream life.

Yet Cullen did not relax his hands. He would not fall into the bitter falsehoods the beast spewed into him.

"Foul and corrupt are they who have taken His gift and turned it against His children. They shall be named Maleficar, accursed ones." Her face began to turn blue, and with each wheezing gasp her struggle weakened. The image before him shifted back to the bed of their false cabin. Yet this time the Darla beneath him dressed in robes that emphasized her being very pregnant. The noises she made burned him. The faintness of her forcing his name from her lips made his fingers twitch, but he wouldn't falter. If she would only be silent and stop her fighting. She manipulated his thoughts and feelings, leaving nothing sacred. Darla wouldn't hurt him like that, but the monster traipsed around in her skin. She was a beast that was all. _Maker preserve me and guide my hand_. "They shall find no rest in this world," Cullen spat each word with more venom than the last. The demon let out a strange agonizing noise followed by a heaving gasping orgasmic cry.

Cullen was back on the tower floor, strangling nothing, but the air. His head shot up, towards the glaring demon, and he returned her expression thrice fold.

"He sure likes to fight doesn't he?" Teresa leaned back against a wall, staring him down with her arms crossed before her chest. Her blue robes were half torn open, so he could see a deformed purple mass on her thigh that, judging by her neck, rose up the length of her body. Teresa had been a pretty girl, more conventionally so than Darla, with her gentle curves and ice blue eyes. Cullen always liked those eyes, they were trustworthy, but now they were black and stared back at him with deadness. No, not deadness, malevolence. Her red lips were curled up into a twisted smirk to match her disgusting nature.

"Unfortunately, yes, mage. He broke from my illusion rather violently." the demon clutched her neck, then rose to her feet and then to the air. She twirled about as her laugh rang through the hall. The demon turned her attention to the abomination. "But how he yearns for more than the life of steel. " The demon spun around again, licking her lips. "Little templar, you enjoyed hurting her didn't you? Getting back at someone whose kind hurt you...naughty."

" Her?" Teresa walked through the cage, followed by the demon.

"Your friend, mage. The one not here. The one you shall see again, the one called Darla, where you shall be free. "

A blissful expression came on Teresa's face as if a light had pierced the veil of her vileness. She moved from the wall forward, brushing loose strands of her hair from her face. The blackness of her left eye began to waver and shift then turned back into its all too familiar paleness. She closed in on Cullen, and he put his hand against the hilt of his sword. She moved as if she had been drowned in mead, and her body reeked of blood. The iron like smell buzzed around his throbbing head. Unless she attacked he resigned himself to his physical weakness. He didn't deserve to survive, but the thought of letting them win consumed him with fury.

"Templar Cullen, this demon...is nothing more than a means to an end. We can give you everything. Uldred has promised-"

He gripped his fingers around the hilt of his sword with a sneer. Hatred roared through him banging in his skull like a wild animal. "You sully our home and betray all it stands for."

"Our home stands for oppression and hatred." Teresa got on her knees, reaching for Cullen, with vacant eyes. She had been so vibrant just days, even hours ago, yet none of that resided within her still. "When I was eight they said "Come to the tower, we will help you," and they did."

"So you turn your back on them?"

"Yes, because no matter how much "help" the enchanters, the templars, and the Chantry give I am trapped. They help me to control me and no more. What life is this, Cullen? I study for years, and do my chores, and maybe one day I earn the title Senior Enchanter. Maybe I end up favored when I'm old and grey and too slow to run, so they let me out to wander the wilds as a doddering old herbalist like Ines?"

"Greagoir spoke so highly of you, a model mage. Bright, polite, and the sort you can almost trust. You were biding your time weren't you? Uldred and his coven of blood mages-"

"No!" Teresa's body shook in hysterics. Her hands wavered as she held her index finger out emphasizing her point like he was a foolish child. She wound her fingers tight, and trails of fresh blood flowed down her wrists. Teresa did not seem to notice, and the burden of the silence between them only abated when the demon snickered. Blood mages weren't desperate they were insane, taken by some festering resentment driven to show their true colors. "I fought them and when Enchanter Boson had me on my knees he let me see the demon's gifts. I could have a life, and it'd be mine."

"Abomination, you will have no life. You will fall, if not by my hand than another. The Order will see to that."

"Yes, the Order deals in taking lives." Teresa stood and turned from him, revealing the tatters to the back of her robes. She had fought for her life, but she had lacked the will to die with respect. Diverging from the Maker's path to save her own mewling life was to be expected. She and Uldred and Boson would sacrifice everything and everyone for their own comfort. Real people had standards, and when they broke them ,at least, most showed regret. Teresa only made his throat tight and his veins boil. She did not deserve her life when the faithful fell. "What will the faith give you? You will end up like every templar, with holes in your brain from lyrium, half forgetting that this-" She motioned around them in half jerking sputtering motions. " ever existed. Until then you will do your duty. Killing mages, branding the curious maleficar, even if they despise demons. You're just as trapped as all of us. Uldred has promised us freedom. While Uldred may want power all we want is to walk free. I'd like to see the mountains again before I die. I want to kiss a girl and not fear it's discovery. I want to go on a picnic with my Jowan, Celwyn, and Darla."

The sound of her name from the demon's lips made him recoil. He had heard Teresa say Darla's name a million times before, but in her corruption she slandered it. It was as if she were a child in a dream, throwing a fit, trying to justify herself. Perhaps it would have been a kindness to run her through, but he could not risk it, not yet.

"Darla would not associate with the likes of you...and Celwyn was cut down by Boson. No mercy..."

Teresa's hands went to her chest, and her fingers began to scrunch and tug at the fabric of her robe. Her body wavered where it stood, as if winds bashed against her from all sides. The news of Celwyn's death seemed to overtake her, pushing her into a rapture of conflict only betrayed by her eyes, which looked beyond Cullen and the demon to nowhere. He had thought her mad moments before, but as her head rolled back and her shoulder's jerked like a broken marionette, the depths of her poisoned psyche came to light. Anguish mutated her pretty face into ugliness, as a tortured sound pierced the air from her petite body. The demon jumped from the wail, staring at the mage and letting out a low hiss as if in pain. Teresa's cry sounded as if the shreds of her remaining humanity were being torn away moment by moment until a tortured beast remained.

The demon flew to Teresa, grabbing her head between her hands. A low bellow left the demon, and Teresa's wail stopped. Teresa's hands fell to her sides,

"Shh...my darling mage. Celwyn awaits you. Celwyn supports you...make the little templar understand. Darla would be most unhappy without him, yes?"

Teresa let out a small sob, but then turned to Cullen without a tear in her eye.

"Y-yes...yes."False warmth came to her face along with the same empty smile as earlier, as she sat on the ground in front of him. "Cullen, you have seen the demon's promises. Join us...the Maker turned his back on us long ago."

"I...pity you. The Maker walks with me even as we speak. The Order-"

Images leapt to his mind of Ostagar, just as described to him in books, with its looming towers and vast bridge surrounded by forests that went on forever. The image contorted to flashes of snarling teeth, and shrieking darkspawn tearing flesh from bone. The Darkspawn encroached upon a small whimpering female figure surrounded by dozens of crimson stained bodies. A broken staff lay at the figure's side, near a limp arm she held close to her body. Dread crept in and Cullen felt the beginnings of the urge to vomit.

"Do not show me this." Cullen shut his eyes tight, attempting to shake the visions out of his mind, but they would not relent.

The woman turned, but he already knew it was Darla. She tried to cast a spell, but only succeeded in letting out a pain ridden groan. She grabbed her arm, grimacing, as a large hurlock encroached on her with blood stained sword.

"Have at me then." Her voice sounded distorted, but he could make out her words well enough. Despite the tears in her eyes she pulled a dagger from her leg. It would do no good. Darla wasn't left handed, nor had she ever really trained with a blade. He used to tease her with other templars, saying she couldn't even butter bread when Ser Derek tried to teach her a little. If only he could go back to his naiveté, to those sweeter times. He turned away, but the sight of the Hurlock rushing her remained clear. The beast let out a roar, which Darla returned in kind. The blade cut through her belly and her dagger fell to the ground. Cullen's insides burned and he clenched his teeth to keep himself from calling out against the vision. The light in her eyes, the thing that he loved most, faded as darkspawn cheered in victory.

The images changed, and suddenly Cullen was on his back against the cold stone of the tower floor. Darla was above him, healthy and fit as ever with the happiest grin he had ever seen. Bile began to rise within him, as he gazed upon her middle. Crimson stains decorated her shirt, as blood cascaded down. The same melodic siren's call flooded the air and filled his aching skull. Another trick that felt, smelled, and looked all too real. The demon would drive him as mad as Teresa. He would not fall, for he was a templar...but for all he told himself that even he had limits. His skin felt clammy and damp, while the air seemed thick in his lungs.

"Submit. It doesn't have to be so, you can save me. We can have a life together. You and me...maybe a child or two, but no promises," Her laughter burned in his ears, filling him with loathing that seethed under his skin. "Please. Cullen..." Darla's hands caressed his face down to his neck than over his chest.

This had to end.

"You can...I have...seen traces of her passing through the Fade...and she may live," Teresa said.

Cruelty like theirs he had never suspected existed in the heart of any creature. Their lies incensed him and the fire within him consumed every rational thought. They dared toy with him, and mock her memory. Nothing mattered to the maleficar, but her deranged freedom. She had food and shelter, more than most people had by far, but she would destroy their home if Uldred or the demons willed it so. Teresa wore the mask of a good woman, but beneath her accursed magic flowed through her as a taint. She wanted freedom, but she crumbled never showing a glint of regret in her eye. Only mages could commit such atrocities, and blacken golden cities. Their home may not have been golden, but it was theirs even if some fool mages never thought it so. The defilers would not desecrate his home any further. They were murderers, profane, monsters bent on breaking his spirit. How many of his friend's fell to their foul magics? How many peaceful tranquil remembered fear at their passing? _No more_. Cullen let out a fierce cry, tearing himself from the illusion as he pulled his sword. Unflinching, he stabbed the demon straight through, then grabbed Teresa by the hair, shoving his sword through her middle before she could cast her spell. While the demon looked positively stunned as the life faded from its eyes, Teresa merely gasped clutching at his shoulder.

"I wouldn't have hurt you...she would have been mad."

For a moment a passing visage of the Teresa he thought he knew shone in her eyes. Teresa, who always volunteered to heal the templars if they were injured, who sat with the children if they became ill, and who could shock everyone with the fact that such lewd jokes came from such an innocent face. Her one blue eye clouded back to black, and she took her last gasping breaths. That Teresa was another lie.

"She is nothing more than you to me. Dead. "


	4. Chapter 4

Chap. 4 So Much Between Us

By the time Cullen had finished his tale two more mugs had been emptied. Her eyes were fixed on him as though she wanted to weep for him. A bubble of self disgust lodged itself in his throat, forcing him to turn away. He did not want her pity anymore than he wanted her to save him that day.

"I didn't realize it was that bad."

"Others...came and went. Mages who toyed with me because the demons liked my..._hunger_. After Teresa I did my best to pray and hide it, but they found other things. My parents, my dead friends, my sister."

"I didn't know you had a sister."

"She was a whore." He had long accepted that fact of his sister's life. There was no point in shying away from the plain facts. "We were orphaned. I was sent to the Chantry, but she was too old and had no interest in becoming a sister." Perhaps the alcohol made his lips flow more freely, but it did little to dull the memories. "I saw her just before I took my vows. She was living in filth and too drunk to recognize me. When she started to sober up and realized who I was she threw me out because she couldn't stand for me to see her." His sister had been such a beautiful girl. Her hair fell in endless blonde waves, and her snorting laugh could light up a room. Those things he remembered less than her hollowed eyes, rancid smell, and gaunt cheeks. Time seemed to erode the good, and leave only the bad, and the brief. "My faith kept me strong."

Darla stroked the back of his hand, but he pulled away. Her touch felt wrong against his skin.

"The point is, I'm sorry, but mages...are not to be trusted. "

"I understand, but you can't paint us all the same."

Cullen let out a low mirthless laugh and crossed his arms.

"Prove to me you are any different." Cold words, but they sounded so correct in his ears. Anyone could fall to evil, or worse to good intentions.

"I have been every day of my life." She slammed her hands down on the table. "I studied hard. I may have been a smart ass, but I never demeaned anyone. I never turned my back on anyone who didn't turn their back on me first. I saved this damn country, and people still look at me and whisper "Bloody mage" "Damnable elf, bossing us around. Maleficar I tell you." I have not fallen. I have not faltered."

"Teresa studied just as hard as you did if not more. Truth was she was well liked in ways not even you could compete with by mage and templar alike, but look what she was."

"What she became," Darla corrected with a glare.

"You cannot become what you do not have the potential to be!"

"So you expected her and other mages to choose death before dishonor?" When Cullen shot a severe, but steady, look in her direction, her lips contorted in disgust. "They promised her more than the Circle could ever give, why should she not take it?"

_Darla is like them_. Yet even as the thought crossed his mind, an enemy from within screamed that it was not so.

Dozens of eyes had begun watching their argument, and the room had quieted. Darla exhaled, making a downward motion with her hands as if to calm herself. "Teresa...was always troubled by the circle. She wanted a life with the Circle not trapped within it. The Circle is...a cycle-"

"That's a terrible pun."

"Oh shut up. You know I'm right. You have the choice to leave, mages have the choice to die."

"Or be made tranquil. "

"Which is worse than death."

"But you still live."

"That is not living. That is only surviving, and even that's debatable. I have heard the stories of the Kirkwall circle, Cullen. Do not pretend they are treated as people."

Cullen winced, turning to his head to avoid the harshness of her stare. The unspoken accusation could not be denied, as much as he wished it weren't so. A rumble of discord had run through the gallows when he brought up the subject of tranquil interrogations within the Order. They wouldn't be to weed out bad behaviors amongst the tranquil, for the tranquil weren't exactly capable of bad behaviors, but amongst his men, his brothers. He had overheard far too many templars trading stories that made his skin crawl. Perhaps Meredith had been too consumed by her paranoia to notice, or perhaps there was more behind her lack of action, but Cullen never understood. He had never dared speak it aloud even after her death, but it was impossible to not wonder if she willfully ignored immoral actions from those within the Order as some sort of twisted revenge against mages like her sister. He understood the complexities of loving someone and hating what they were, but the wide spread abuses mages murmured about were written off and ignored in a way he had never condoned. Regardless, with her death he had reached a position to deter further abuses.

Still Cullen was torn to do something about it. The Tranquil he had spoken with did not have the capacity to care. Furthermore they lacked the ability to feel anything towards anyone who did misuse their condition. They desired no justice because they desired nothing at all. To uphold the image of the noble templar knight was his aim, but when his brothers told him that he sought to defend those who didn't want defending his convictions waned. Regardless, Darla had no right to throw that in his face.

"So you would rather die than be tranquil?"

"Yes." Her answer was as if he asked if she wanted another ale, or a sweet roll. The dead seriousness of her face unsettled him, but his face remained still. Was it truly such a horrible fate that a mage would rather become an abomination? Mages must have been truly delusional to think that, but Darla couldn't have been. She was very thoughtful about such things last he knew, but he couldn't understand. "Emotions are who we are. They tie us to our lives. I'd kill myself first."

Cullen laced his fingers together, nodding, as he tried to process the thought of her doing such a desperate act. He could picture her doing almost anything, but the thought of her slicing open her wrists seemed inherently wrong.

As a boy he believed the Order held some of the most faithful and honorable men and woman across Thedas. In Ferelden, this belief deepened because most templars who mentored him worked to instill that sense of honor. Of course, there were those who abused their position or took it because they had nothing else. Some left the Order against their wills or by choice, but they lacked the heart for their duty. Yet he had met some of the most dedicated and pious of the Order who, regardless of their views on mages, did their duty with honor. He had thought the dishonorable, the cruel, and the monsters masquerading in Templar armor to be a minority. However, his time in Kirkwall had showed him different, and sometimes he wondered if youthful naiveté clouded his memories of Ferelden. A young woman with a smart mouth, like Darla, would probably have never made it to her harrowing before he had taken charge in the gallows. To be tranquil was a mercy, the problem lay in weeding out the chivalrous templars from the beasts. Darla must have understood that as a Warden. When she recruited that bastard apostate she made the same mistake as many others in their position had. Perhaps that only deepened her convictions against being tranquil.

"You would have mages run free then? What of those who wish to deal with demons?"

"I am not arguing for an end to the Order, or dissolving the Circle. You know that, but... it is not so simple. Templars have more authority than the most well respected of mages in so many ways. That kind of power is dangerous in any hands even with the best of intentions."

She may as well have mentioned Meredith by name. Protecting the people drove her to extremes. He could recall the three mages who fell at their feet, begging for their lives, and proclaiming their innocence. If they had been blood mages they'd never run at them so willingly, but Meredith dismissed his attempt to vouch for their innocence. Without a spell being cast, the mages were cut down at their feet. Their eyes didn't haunt him as much as the reality that he had been no better than Meredith. The gallows were far more severe than the tower, but even then Darla managed to save lives that he would have thrown away. Lives no different than the mages whose heads had rolled across the cold floor of the gallows. Maybe he was no different than Meredith beneath it all, but even when he was sent from the tower for his outburst after Uldred...he had found the path again. Cullen walked that road better than before with true vigilance, yet it still ended in another betrayal.

"What are you thinking?" Darla's voice had a lightness to it, but the look in her eyes showed that she read him like a book.

"I'm wondering how I ever got here."

"By walking or horse I'd assume." Cullen tried to restrain the laughter within him, but a chuckle escaped and she beamed at him as if she found some long lost treasure. "You should laugh more often."

"You are such an ass"

The words left him without thinking, and as soon as they are said he turned bright red. He half expected her to slap him, but instead she burst into laughter. She looked surprised, but not dismayed.

"Yes I am...I suppose at the end we are all asses. I think it makes me more of a person. Even mages can be people." Cullen swallowed, nodding at her words while meeting her eyes with a steady gaze. They did not need to speak. For all of Cullen's faults and second guessing he could read her well enough to know she knew his true feelings. The truth spoke volumes of sadness in her eyes. "Against our will, but yes, we are all people. Mages just so happen to be more dangerous than others sometimes, yet you are dangerous too. Once upon a time if you were to drain me you could probably strike me down without breaking a sweat."

Cullen felt his skin go cold, and for a brief moment he was back in the harrowing chamber, keeping silent vigil over her body, and fearing that when she awoke nothing of her would be left. Yet her phrasing caught his ear. "Once?"

"Oh...well, it is a long story. A spirit taught me-" Darla stopped, staring at his face, raising a brow as his own furrowed. "Do not think that way. It was not a demon and I am no blood mage. However, I encountered a spirit trapped by old elven magic. A warrior long asleep, and waiting for kin so the art would not be completely lost."

Her words were troubling. Cullen had heard many stories of darker magic among the dalish or of demons masquerading as kind spirits.

"What do you speak of?"

"The Chantry...the circle...many things exist as legends, but rarely are they allowed to exist as fact." Darla sighed, leaning back. "Long story short, I learned how the ancient elves used mages as warriors. I'm only carrying a staff for your comfort and the comfort of those around us. My sword is in my room at the inn with Salazar."

"Salazar?"

"He's my dog. He's a bit grey at the muzzle, but he'll tear anyone to bits in a minute."

Cullen felt as though his head was spinning. Spirits? Dogs? Swords? The Darla he knew couldn't swing a sword without hurting herself.

"You look...stunned."

"N-no...things have just changed so much."

"Cullen...has everything truly changed that much?"

The tone of her voice startled him, and his heart caught in his throat.

"Darla, do not go there."

For a moment he couldn't tell if she was going to grin or sigh, but her expression refused to change. She seemed to pull back within herself, and that only made Cullen more uncomfortable.

"Then the answer is yes. "

"You said you had a man."

"I do, and I love him."

"Then why are you pushing this?" Sparks of rage began to crackle within him. He had tried to push past those feelings, to fight them off in the name of the greater good. She didn't need to confuse him, or to play with his heart like a mandolin.

"...I miss it...I miss the old days...I miss not being anything but a lady. I miss my home, and when I go back there is no one to truly greet me and few who truly know me."

With her words Cullen's anger began to fade. His heart went out to her, in more ways than one, but what could either of them do. Even if they could turn back time chances were she'd be dead in that tower like so many others. Yet he understood that desire to go back to happier days. In his dreams those days haunted him and with the passing years, when he tried to recall them he struggled to. In truth, Cullen couldn't recall what it felt like when he first assumed his post before the effects of lyrium had become a second skin. He yearned for a time when he could just trust people, even mages with a dose of healthy suspicion instead of fearing assassins or angry princes around every corner.

"I...miss it too."

"Maker forgive me," Darla looked down at his hand, holding it in her own. "I miss you as well. I have a man who I love, but I never forgot you. I don't even know if he loves me still sometimes, but you always cared and I always cared about you."

Cullen's body was on fire and everything in his mind screamed for him to walk away. Despite her position as a Warden she was still a made, and to be in such a compromising manner with her could be disastrous. The slightest gesture could be misconstrued. Yet his beating heart took command of his throat.

"For years you've been in my mind...I'm never sure if I hate you or love you. After all these years you make me stammer and...for the first time in so many years I feel less like a templar and more of a man." It was all true. Cullen had thrown himself into his faith and his work. He trusted his men and befriended them, but looking back he could see how distant he had become towards almost everyone. The only person beside Greagoir he had trusted fully had been Meredith, and she betrayed him as easily as Uldred. Yet the woman he had forsaken, had come back to him and had never turned her back on him...unless he turned his on her first. Cullen tried to collect himself. Darla had a man, and probably a good one, though something obviously was off if she wasn't sure he loved her. The man must have been a fool if he didn't. Still that man wasn't there, and none of that mattered. He'd repent to the Maker later, but his heart demanded it be heard. "I'd never abandon my duties, but you have no idea how many times I wished I could. In my most disgraceful and beautiful dreams I'd smuggle you out of the tower. We'd run off and have a family together. The things I wanted to do with you...to you...I wanted to be with you always even when I hated myself for it."

His outpouring of emotion left Darla with a surprised expression and flushed cheeks. In her eyes, plain as day, he could read her love for him and her desire. It wasn't the love he knew they both dreamed of long ago, but it was the love of the first love. Sometimes the time and place were never right. Sometimes everything never came together.

"This may surprise you, but...that's one of the most beautiful things I've ever heard." Somewhere between the urge to laugh, the urge to kiss her, and the urge to run away Cullen stood. He should have said nothing, but he had spent years doing what he should and he tired of it. "I wish we could have had another life."

"I know."

At that moment something clicked in her eyes, and Cullen realized her statement contained an unspoken question that he began through inviting her to meet him where no one would really know them or be able to confirm who they were. They were destined to be no more than what they were at that instant of time. Destiny, or terrible circumstance had come between their youthful love and brought them together as battered adults. They both held power and positions their younger selves couldn't even imagine. Long ago they would have never dared touching each other, not to mention looking at each other with such desperate need. For all intents and purposes, their lives had changed in unexpected ways. Only two things from the past had remained the same. The first was that he trusted her despite himself. He was betrayed again and again from all sides, but she was a stalwart figure throughout the years. The second was that Cullen wanted her. He wanted to trust someone again, even if it wasn't himself. Darla had meant something throughout those years apart. He was no fawning school boy, but he had never let those feelings go. They had a chance to act on those long lasting feelings.

"I will not leave him."

"I know. I wouldn't ask you to."

"I know." Darla looked away as if she felt disgraceful, but all Cullen could see was the girl he once and always adored. "I'm a sinner...I've done terrible things."

"So have I." The words held such unwavering confidence that Cullen almost flinched. "I have killed innocents, children. I have punished not the wicked, but the lonely..." Cullen tried to bury his memory of Gavin disappearing down to the dock of the gallows without armor. He saw the mages he injured in the tower in a hate filled rage. He could remember the boy mage's fearful face as plain as day. " I have done things based on suspicion that...you'd hate me for." Through his shame the burden of his deeds lifted. It had been a long time since he had anyone to talk to.

"Can we have this...can we have now?"

Cullen shut his eyes, covering her hand with his. They had stolen moments, but nothing else could ever be. He'd always wonder, and as she stared at him with eyes rimmed with tears, he knew she would as well. He'd never know how many nights she'd thought of him, or if she'd have ever have admitted her feelings. It'd be a hanging question, "what could have been" for the rest of his life. He could live with that.

"Not now." Without opening his eyes he could see the near panic of confusion on her face. It mirrored the feeling in his bones. "Tonight. Only for tonight do I wish to be the boy you loved."

"Come to my room at the inn. It is the last one in the left hall."Cullen swallowed, fighting the desire to feel her bare skin against his then and there. There could be no more running for him, but she had so much to consider. He would never wish to drag her down because of his love.

"Darla, perhaps it is a choice you must make considering-"

"I'd never go to you, Cullen. I couldn't bring myself to..."

The memory of her pained expression as he screamed at Darla, the real Darla, for wanting to save her beloved mentor and friends. She had seemed like a broken child for just an instant, before turning and going to face the horrors of the harrowing chamber. Something in her eyes seemed shattered. For years he told himself that he had merely imagined her reaction, but as she sat staring at their hands he knew it was real. He would come to her, after all he owed her that much.


	5. Under My Skin

**Under My Skin**.

Another perspective of "**The Maker Forgives"**

Surana never looked back at the man kneeling upon the tower floor, but when she neared the stairs she stopped. Everything in her head screamed for her to control herself, to put aside that man."Is it silly that I wished you looked at me more?"

The words had been a whisper, and she did not know why she recalled them years after the fact. Perhaps it was because she could see the tavern where Cullen asked to meet her, and it made her hands tingle with sweat. Still her old desires were from years long gone. Regardless the past still cut like a wound, and every step seemed to deepen the sting. She had never forgotten about Cullen, nor the hurt he caused her.

The tower had been her home, and -perhaps selfishly- she ran there after Ostagar. Surana told her companions that despite what happened there the mages knew her. Without a doubt they would believe her if she spoke of Loghain's betrayal, and the horrors of Ostagar. The first enchanter would trust her, even the knight-captain would see reason. At the least Cullen would believe her words. Greagoir seemed to favor him, and that could work to her advantage. Cullen had always been able to see things fairly. Perhaps, he'd even volunteer to travel with them. Maybe outside the tower they could forgo the act of templar and mage.

Surana held onto that thought, as the smell of death lingered in her nose from the blood soaked battlefield. She gripped the thought, trapped it in her heart, because as much as she enjoyed the adventure of it all Cullen's shy glances marked her heart in ways she still couldn't give voice to.

"You are a mage, and I am a templar." The words still echoed in her ears.

He cast her aside with a hard stare as just another mage. Not a woman. Not a warden. Not even an elf. Always a mage, the brand of her being. Cullen loathed the very blood in her veins and that hatred filled his heart. There could be no room for love. Regardless of anything he said she would never hate the power in her blood. She would give no man that kind of power over her heart. Never, Nothing had changed in her, but the blood on her hands. What was within remained herself, but to Cullen it did not matter.

He loved her just days before. Surana swore she saw it in his eyes. Words weren't necessary, but as he stared her down in those red splashed walls and corpse riddled floor the only thing in his eyes spat at her like she were a monster.

And yet, she wished he looked at her more. Because maybe then she could have found that part of him she once touched. Maybe then she could have put away the past, and known if it were true hate or trauma. If she had imagined his glances or if they were real. Instead all she had to carry through the years was Cullen's hatred.

Time had passed on, and there were days when Alistair's eyes couldn't reach her, or wouldn't. There the days when he recounted Morrigan, the times when he and Surana made love only for him to be unable to continue, the times when she wondered if he wished for a child, and the times when the unbearable weight of her duty crushed her as it pulled them both to far corners of and in Thedas. Some nights when he thought she slept, he whispered prayers to the maker for his transgression...and for his child. Everything in her knew it was right, but it burned her heart and left her cold. Still she loved him the same as she always did.

Why did she come on Cullen's request?

It was stupid of her. He should be in Kirkwall. Who knows what would be coming in the following months? The circle hounded her for support, and the wardens did everything to sever her ties to them, and...when did her life become complicated?

Surana chuckled, stopping and leaning against the wall of a store. Passersby glanced at her, some stared and pointed. Perhaps because she was a southern elf, but no elves stared too. Surana looked down, remembering she had worn her formal uniform. She could have worn her old circle robes, but that'd be trying to hard to remind him of the past. Besides she wasn't just some mage. Not anymore. She was the warden-commander. A place she earned despite calls in the order for a full investigation into her actions during the blight and her request from Queen Anora. No one had managed to oust her though. Not yet anyway.

Politics were a game she was quite adapt at. She had foiled just as many assassination attempts with a word as with a blade. Many ,Surana suspected, came from Weisshaupt itself, or maybe Anora, who now found her kindness to the Circle a threat to her many religious supporters. There were lingering questions as to whether the Queen would turn on Surana as easily as she did in the past, and call for mages in the wardens to be sent to the circle?

_I can expect no less...but I doubt it_. She would have smiled if she half believed it.

To be a mage was a dangerous position. Just weeks before she had been forced to conscript a group of several mages who had escaped from Ferelden. It was either that or allow the templars to execute them before the vigil.

A heavy sigh left her. Once upon a time she would have dug the graves herself, but she hadn't the time. Worse yet, as each mage fell a trickle of apathy followed by nauseating guilt wracked her body. She had spared them the fate of being in solitary confinement for months or worse, being made tranquil. _What choice did I have? They killed ten templars._

She ran her fingers through her silver hair, then looked at her hands. Pale scars marred her perfect brown skin. When Cullen last saw those hands they were the hands of a heavy reader, not a woman with a sword. Though she _had_ left her sword at the inn, so maybe he wouldn't notice. A hollow chuckle rumbled through her chest. Surana played a fool's game if she could convince herself of that. He would see the bags beneath her eyes, the wrinkles on her brow, and the scars over her hands and arms. There could be no hiding from the passage of time.

She rested a hand to her chest, and shut her eyes. It was foolish going there. What was she looking for? She couldn't have been lonely, she had thousands of friends though few knew her before she was the hero of Ferelden, or Warden-Commander. Few had met the girl in circle robes who stood in the tower chantry and fiercely debated the canticles of Shartan with the lay sisters, or who had spent weeks practing chess just so she had a chance of one day beating the First Enchanter in a game. These days she sometimes she felt like she forgot her first name. But Cullen would remember that girl, and hopefully she would not disappoint.

Cullen.

How often did she pen that name to her journal? How often did her hand slip between her legs to thoughts of him? She used to stare at him on the rare occasions he wasn't staring at her. Scandalous rumors still circulated about the hero of Ferelden having a tryst with a high ranking templar.

Her face became hot, and her fingers twitched. The feelings in her heart betrayed the love of her life, and sent fear into her spine. After all those years Surana wished those stories were true. She wished that Cullen would look at her with those shy uncertain eyes, and without words say that unspeakable thing. In that moment the world would float away, and she'd be herself again. She'd be a woman to him and that would consume everything else, maybe even her if she let it. It sounded wonderful, and it shouldn't have.

She swallowed, shaking her head, and rolling her eyes. Those thoughts and desires were overly romantic. Immature even if they were true. The time had passed, and yet somehow it felt so incomplete. Part of her still stood outside his cage in the tower, waiting to hear him say "Forgive me." The sickness of it twisted her insides into impossible knots, the sort Alistair teased her about not knowing how to tie. A sigh left her lips. Alistair saw her as a woman, but even then it seemed as though he still thought of her as "the leader", the one to be admired...the Warden-Commander.

_What would Alistair say if he knew where I was_?

He'd probably yell then walk away never to be seen again, but no he was too loyal to the order. He'd ask for reassignment, and she'd grant it. Alistair would glare at her one final time, never giving her the courtesy of saying her real name, just spitting "Warden-Commander" with all the venom in his heart. His eyes, the eyes that made her want to live forever, would darken until Surana couldn't see herself in them anymore. There would be no more late night cheese escapades, no more apologies after failed love making, no more jokes to start the day. There would only be him, walking away from her. Maybe then she'd throw herself into the deep roads and save the assassins some time and her enemies some money.

Those were just flights of fancy, idle thoughts. Those were the kind of thoughts she used to not have so often. They seemed to have become her constant companion over the last few years. She missed the days when her pessimistic words were just dry humor, and not her fears.

She was there in that village, next to that tavern, and she was stalling. Surana wasn't that nameless girl anymore. She straightened up, and drew in a slow steady breath. When did she let herself become so weak? Her life had been spent being strong, and it made her a capable confident woman. She walked forward, refusing to turn, digging her nails into her palms.

The choice had been made, and she had come to him, yet each step drove her fears deeper. She missed his voice, his curls, his...friendship. _Blast all that romance nonsense_. But it didn't leave her mind. It didn't go away. Surana loved who she was. Honestly she did, but...she still remembered how she laughed at Jowan's jokes, and how she looked at the world with such unspoken wonder. More than anything she remembered one word from Cullen sent her into fits of joy. As much as she had changed, maybe the girl she was still existed.

Maybe meeting an old friend would help her find that girl again. Maybe if he said her name again she could keep it. It used to be that the world slowed when he said her name. The sweetness of how he said it would drive her mad.

_"D-Darlteness-"_

_"I told you to call me Darla, didn't I?" Surana stopped, putting a hand on her hip. If not for her raised brow and raised corners of her mouth, one would think her upset._

_"Darla...right...got it." Cullen smiled at her, and for a moment she thought she lost her mind. He said it so tenderly, and yet with utmost respect, as if she were someone else. Didn't he know there was magic in her veins? Didn't he see her ears? Her dark skin? Didn't he see the same demon yellow eyes everyone else did, and hear her scream about Shartan being cast aside from the Chant because the Chantry learned to hate elves? Didn't he see she was just another mage, just another heretical monster in the dark?_

_She started to speak, to tell him that he didn't need to fake such kindness. But his eyes put her in her place. No, he only saw her. It had been foolish, but she almost asked if he'd say her name again._


	6. Chapter 5

_"They are sinners, who have given their love to false gods"_

Hours later Cullen lay on his inn bed, staring up at the ceiling unable to quite process what had transpired, nor what he'd agreed to. The weight of the evening pressed down on his chest. He had done a great many things in his life, and he hoped he had done more good than ill, but he had never allowed himself to cross such a stringent line. Somewhere in Ferelden Darla had a man she loved, and in weakness she had agreed to give into a lost thing. They had so much power and yet they ended up consenting to base desire.

Yet that desire spoke of a much more innocent time. Maybe they both needed to sin to feel clean in the grey muck that made up their lives. Or maybe they'd feel like shit in the morning and she'd regret every second. Cullen ran his fingers through his hair, rolling onto his side. His gleaming armor faced him, and in the fading light from the windows and flickering candles the sword and sun cast long shadows. The invisible weight on his chest bared down further. Cullen had lead a good life, yet he was willing to soil his soul with lust for a woman he barely knew anymore.

Cullen didn't remember his conversations with Darla being so frantic. He didn't remember her as someone who cried, except that one time before she left. He didn't remember how hard it was to be around her because the pain of being torn in two directions could only be understood when she said his name. Her voice set off blazes in his blood that he had never been able to fully put out, but what did that mean anymore?

Darla seemed to be a living memory, a monument to what he'd been and what he once believed- the goodness of people. He did not lie when he said he missed her, and she must have missed him. No love could ever be like the first, even if it could not be true. If he could have one night with her, perhaps then he'd be able to look ahead. He could forget what she made him feel afterwards, but until then those feelings would run rabid through his skin. Still...a man lay somewhere unaware of Darla's traitorous acts, and the fact that Cullen was her compatriot. Stranger, or no, her lover deserved to be treated decently.

But didn't Cullen also deserve happiness, however brief?

"What am I doing?" He shut his eyes tight, trying to ignore the war between heart and head. To his misfortune the silence only made it louder. Cullen was a man of the order, but he was still a man. She brought that out in him with such ease that he could almost forget how hard he fought it. A mage made him feel the most human. Perhaps the Maker could forgive him for straying from honor so long as he found his way again. Maybe Darla could even help him, and from what it seemed she needed him as bad as he her. _She used to have a lighter laugh...and maybe it was youth, but she did not seem so...lost._

Grey Wardens were said to march into the Deep Roads farther than even the Legion of the Dead. She had fought monsters beyond his own imagination, if the rumors were true. Darla may have been the strongest person he knew, followed by the champion herself. Yet the toughest of people felt the scrape of harsh experience just like everyone else in the end. He had thought so much of her when writing, yet he hadn't considered the changes over the years. What had he expected to find when he met her again? He supposed he missed the boy who smiled and stuttered, and that blinded him to all else.

The weight spread from his chest to the rest of his body. Though he tried to forget her, to hate her, and to deny his own feelings they had remained. For years he convinced himself that he glorified her in his mind, and he had in some ways. Mistakes like the apostate and the secrets she refused to speak brought the reality of who she was to the fore. He had glorified her and vilified her like a chasind goddess, a false god.

_But did I ever care?_

His stomach twisted into knots, and he swallowed the truth as the realization coveted his mind. He couldn't be sure if he'd be crushed from inside or out. The emblem on her robes changed nothing of what she should be to him, and maybe he did not want it to. No matter what, certain things could not be allowed. Cullen drew in a deep breath, trying to parse out his feelings. Did he love the idol, the villain, or the real breathing Darla?

Darla's magnificence still shone, and it pulled him in. At the core she still had the same light in her eye, and he still loved that light regardless of the years. Surana...Darla...Warden-Commander...whatever people called her she was still herself. And despite what he saw in his own reflection, she still saw him, not some templar.

They loved false gods that no longer existed, who died in the tower lost to betrayal. They loved children who hadn't seen the world, and saw in each other a world beyond their reach. They loved themselves and each other more than they ever should have, and worse their eyes both reflected the same lost feeling. Cullen felt the ache in his bones and winced. His youth had been robbed by the cruelty of mages, and the cruelty of petty politics. Darla saw that youth in him. With her there wasn't any pretense. He loved Darla...the false goddess, the girl, or the genuine article who had cried so freely before him hours ago. It didn't matter who so long as she smiled at him with such love in her eyes.

_Darla...Cullen...who we are...who we were we can never be again, but..._

Cullen opened his eyes, sitting up then walking across the room to the window, watching the lingering light vanish behind two buildings. The night had fallen, and he knew what they could not say in words would be said in other ways. A quiet excitement began to build inside him along with nerves. It was wrong of him, but it was just another thing he had to live with. Perhaps it should have been shameful, but Cullen did not dwell on the thought. He turned towards the door, leaving his armor behind him.

It took far too long to go from staring to knocking upon her door. In no small part due to the large Mabari hound watching him from the corner, chewing on what appeared to be ruined molding pantaloons. The beast did not growl, perhaps he knew he didn't need to, because the mabari's eyes were intimidating enough to give a demon pause. Why did it seem like every powerful woman on Thedas owned a damned mabari hound?

After an eternity the door creaked open, and Darla stood before him clad in nothing more than a purple dress, that did far more for her figure than robes ever did. It was hard not to be reminded of the demon's vision...the sight of Darla's bare shoulders, her smile, her... To call it unsettling belittled the sensation, but when Darla stepped aside, the slight smile she gave him set him right back to that boy who trusted so easily.

He walked in, keeping his hands from shaking by focusing on the room. The Wardens must have paid her well, for it was spacious. On a table beside a sprawling map sat what appeared to be chainmail and black leather armor, while her robes from earlier in the day were across a chair. He must have not heard the door click because the next thing he noticed was Darla's hand touching his back as she brushed past him, looking at what had caught his attention.

"Ah, that is armor I picked up years ago when I was first at Vigil's Keep. I had never seen anything like it before, pure black, and it felt like a second skin. When I fought the archdemon I had worn this bulky plate mail. It was quite...uncomfortable, but I did not want to risk it."

Picturing the petite elven woman in heavy armor strained his mind. She looked at his perplexed expression, and let out a rather girlish giggle that sent red straight to his face.

"I get that a lot you know. Few people have seen an elf in armor needless to say an elven woman in heavy armor, casting a frost spell."

Self consciousness took hold and his eyes fell to the floor.

"I...don't mean to insult you."

"Cullen..." The gentleness in her voice sent a shiver down his spine. It sounded as if she was chastising him and calling to him all at once. She put her hands on his arms, turning him around to face her. "I'd never think that." As she finished his awareness of how close she stood to him overwhelmed him. She had such full pretty lips, all too enticing. After so many years of wondering, of yearning, he needed to know what they tasted like. Adrenaline rushed through his body to the point it blurred out all , but their breath. The world that brought them there faded to fast pumping blood. It took over, and without hesitation he seized her body against his. Darla did not pull from him, as his lips crashed against hers with aggression that shocked, and almost frightened him. Cullen expected her to turn him away then and there, but she only slid her arms around him, ensnaring him in a kiss he wanted to go on forever. If the chantry told the truth they'd be struck down by lightening at any moment, but it would not have been an unpleasant way to go.

The passion did not overwrite the fact that having her in his arms felt so unfamiliar. Darla's body was a mixture that reflected the life she lead, doughy in some places like her bottom and firm in others like her arms. He could feel the small valleys and peaks of old scars across her body, and was filled with the urge to explore each one. In his arms she felt so small, and yet she encompassed him entirely inside and out.

When they broke their kiss both were breathless, and the ease of breaking the taboo left them staring dumbfounded at each other. For all Darla's seeming indifference towards others opinions, part of her waited for some awful thing to happen just as he had. After a moment her expression softened, and she took Cullen's hand leading him to her bed. Her hand trembled slightly in his own. Their eyes locked, but he dared not speak for fear of ruining their stolen moment. Nothing could be said that she did not already know. If she asked if he were sure then he might change his mind, or make her more nervous.

She let herself fall back onto the bed, her arm outstretched to pull him to her. There she lay open and waiting for him to submit to himself-to himself for once. No turning back. Cullen climbed atop her, managing to force his boots from his feet, as she caressed his cheek. Her eyes said that she never could leave the past behind. That she loved him and loved him still even if it wasn't right. "We never had a chance to make this real. Not in this life," the sorrow in her smile said. He took her hand from his cheek, kissing it lightly before pressing his lips to hers.

Cullen longed to make the night stretch out. By the morning he needed to know her body in ways that only pained his dreams. He began to kiss down her jaw to her neck. Cullen wanted to claim her, even if it was only temporary. She was not a mage, but his mage, his Lady Surana, and every instinct made him want her to know that. He grazed his lips along her neck then sucked, giving gentle then harder bites that made her writhe and grind up against him. The scent of lavender and fresh pine filled his nose, and he paused to breathe it in. It was not the scent he remembered, but as his lips traveled farther down across her chest, he committed it to memory.

Cullen drew in a slow breath, as his fingers slowly pulled her sleeves downward. When the fabric had been tugged down to her waist, and her breasts were exposed he exhaled. Arousal began to cloud his mind. He slid her dress down over her hips, and she wiggled her rear to ease the process, brushing against his hardness repeatedly. He could not tell if it were intentional or not, but he did not care. He pulled back a little, observing her body, sliding his fingers over her sides to trace faded and fresh scars. Darla's body was peppered with pale faded scars, like a map of her life. A long diagonal one ran across her belly, causing a doleful sense of failure to rise within his chest. Immaturity meant feeling responsible for things beyond ones power, at least that's what Greagoir had told him. Still, he wondered if he could have protected her, and how long it took to recover from such a serious wound. A touch of her hand raised his chin so their eyes met, but he refused to hide the sorrow from his face.

"You are...so sweet."

The words rolled off her tongue and filled him. She read him like a book every damn time. Until that night he had never heard her voice so subdued, so frightened of the meaning beneath her words, yet so earnest. This wasn't like the few nights he'd spent in the Blooming Rose. It was real.

A surge of need took him, and his lips went to her breast. Cullen needed to make her feel young again. The tip of his tongue circled her nipple, as his other hand grasped her breast. She let out a small whimpering groan, and as he trapped her nipple between his lips he felt it harden against his tongue. This only deepened his lust, and with his other hand he began to flick and pinch her left nipple. Darla reached a hand to his crotch, loosening the draw strings of his pants. She paused briefly to stroke his manhood through his pants, forcing a grunt from Cullen against her breast. With a little assistance from his free hand, she undid his pants then pushed them to his ankles. He kicked them aside, but in that moment of distraction she grasped his length, causing him to freeze. Her hand gripped him with just the right amount of firmness, as if she had done it before. Perhaps she had in her dreams. When she began to stoke Cullen nearly saw stars. He switched breasts, suckling and moaning into her flesh. Her strokes gradually gained speed, and within moments Cullen questioned if he could last as long as he'd like. He hadn't been with a woman in years, and her hands were wonderfully soft. At each upstroke she lingered, focusing on the head of his cock before continuing. Cullen drew in a breath, ceasing his sulking to try and collect himself. The pleasure tore him between wanting to release himself in her hand, and waiting to truly mark her as having been his. As if on command a rush of pleasure bolted through him, another stroke would send him over the edge. At once he grabbed her hand, flushed for reason he hadn't foreseen. Darla looked down with fevered nervousness, and he tried to give her a reassuring smile despite the embarrassment.

"L-let's make this last." At his words, a glint of recognition came to her eye followed by a nod. Cullen swallowed, praising the Maker for granting her such a kind heart. He left a trail of kisses from her breasts to between her legs, lingering over each scar. He made sure to memorize each blemish with his lips. Once before her womanhood, he glanced up to the sight of her blushing. His eyes asking silent permission to continue. When she nodded he grasped her legs by the thigh, spreading them wide. Her thighs were more muscular than he imagined, but they were still delicate when compared to other women. He lined each thigh with kisses, feeling the blood tide of arousal lessen into something he hadn't expected. At first it had been raw passion, but for the moment it had become raw tenderness. In letting him touch her she was giving him a great gift, and his nature demanded he show her proper gratitude for that. He trailed his lips up to the apex of her womanhood, somewhat surprised to find the thick curls of hair on her mound were as white as her hair. He let out a small chuckle.

"What?" She looked down, raising herself on her elbows.

"I...uh...always assumed you dyed your hair with a spell?" He turned his head, waiting for her to call him a moron and send him away.

"Well...who said I didn't." Her words shocked him, and he stared somewhat slack jawed at her, "But then again who said I did?" Cullen let out another laugh, as the lingering tension in the air lessened. His attention turned back to the glistening wetness of her womanhood. It was unlike anyone else he had been with, he couldn't quite think of a way to describe it beyond pleasant. Tracing his index finger over her lips, delighting in the shuddering moans that ravaged her from just a light caress, he realized he could describe it. She was as he imagined as a boy, pure like an untouched forest even if she had in fact been touched. Perhaps it was a terrible analogy considering she was an elf, but Cullen pushed the thought from his mind. He replaced his hand with the tip of his tongue, causing her to let out a staggering gasp that quickly escalated into an orchestral moan when he found her sensitive bundle of nerves. He would tease her going in half circles, making her think his tongue would find it again, before reversing. Cullen had never been one for torture, but if all torture could be like that then things might have been different. _Maker_. She tasted somewhat sweet like fruit and yet also earthy in a way he found hard to describe, but delighted in none the less. An animalistic whimper of need hit his ears, and almost froze him in place. A hard shiver ran down his spine, and his arousal surged again, bleeding in with the tenderness he desired to show her. At once he began to lick and suck the swollen bud, eliciting loud unseemly cries from her lips. Those sounds were better than anything he could have ever dreamed in the Fade and beyond some false demons nonsense. Darla, his mage, was a real breathing woman, and he could make her into a beast of desire that no demon could mimic. She reached down, entwining her fingers in his curls, and a smile crept on his lips.

When Cullen awoke the next morning Darla still lay in his arms, and the candles in the room had burned out. From her window he could see the beginnings light blue sky driving off the darkness. The world would return to normal soon. He stared up at the rafters of the ceiling, feeling a strange sensation in his body. Cullen couldn't place a name for it beyond resignation. He wished it could last forever, but the real world had already dictated his plans and hers. He knew from the start it would be one amazing night, and then they would carry on. Yet what if instead of hiding out in the tower he had insisted on accompanying her to stop the blight? Would he be waking beside her everyday and not the stranger her heart belonged to more than his ever could?

Cullen let out a silent sigh. It didn't matter, and was silly to think of. He smiled, wondering why the Maker cursed him to be a romantic.

"Morning," Darla said, nuzzling against him closer. Cullen slid his other arm around her, enjoying the warmth of her body.

"Good morning."

They looked at each other, and Cullen felt himself unable to stop smiling. Nothing would change the fact that he loved to look at her pretty face. Yes, the feeling he felt was resignation. For a while they laid together in silence, cuddling as if they were young lovers. After a moment, she glanced toward the window, and frowned.

"For a long time, I dreamed of you. I'd imagine a world where we ran away together and never looked back. You'd join a city guard, and I'd tend to the children. We'd have three. Two boys and a girl. " She let out a heavy exhale, he touched her shoulder, but she refused to look at him again. She rolled over onto her side. "Or where I'd asked you to come with me and stop the blight. Or...where I could be myself and be free-a woman with magic who simply fell in love with a wonderful man..."

Cullen's heart grew heavy, and he enveloped her in his arms. He placed a kiss upon her neck.

"As did I."

"Sometimes I'd sleep, and think I reached out to you in the Fade. Sometimes I wondered if you were really a demon or a figment of a dream." Her words put pause in Cullen's heart. If she felt that way too then it was quite possible she had. Perhaps in the web of dreams they lived another life away from duty and betrayal. He wanted to speak up, but he feared deepening their brief reprieve from life into something it could not be. "It was as if we lived a far off life...lost in the fade. It sounds rather childish...but I don't care."

For a brief moment he felt something stir in the back of his mind, a faint and distant memory that he couldn't bring to the surface. It slipped through his fingers just as the memory came to the fore. The lingering thought it left was that not all mages were evil, and not all templars abused their power. Yes, most were like him and her, capable of being friends, allies, and more. That did not mean one night robbed Cullen of his faculties, he scoffed at the thought. The night, and the afternoon had only served to remind him of her humanity and his own. Cullen believed in his duty, but that did not limit his thoughts.

"One day...I'd like to believe we'll come up with something better. Where a boy of the order can love a circle mage without pause," Cullen said, trailing fingers in circles over her sides.

"So do I. " A small shiver ran through her, and the growing light signaled its cause. "We will have to return to life soon."

"Yes."

"Cullen, you would never have run away me anywhere, even if we said what we felt back then, wouldn't you?"

It was not a question, but a statement of fact. A small pang of guilt welled up in him, but he nodded. "No, I wouldn't have."

"Good. I would not have love you as much as I did if you abandoned your ideals so easily."

Her words signaled the illusion of what they had was fading with the coming day, but neither moved. They could pretend for just a while longer that they weren't part of life, that the dirtiness of what their duties meant eluded them, and that their disagreements were dust in the wind. Cullen knew that once the day came the dream would be buried, but it sat lighter in him than it had for all the years he ignored it. He felt almost as if he were freer than before. The shadows weren't as long or dark. It was as if she had lifted a thin veil from his eyes like a man courting a longtime widow.

"When you say such...that is how I know you are still you inside, so I must still be me too." Darla's words were but a whisper, but they shook Cullen to his very core. His chest felt warm, and he felt more naked than moments before, more so than even when he thrust into her and lost himself inside her. She would say something profound without warning, and leave him unsure of how to internalize it. He wasn't confused, or agitated, but the words left him in a state of disarray. As he lay there, he shut his eyes thinking over the his encounters with the champion, Orsino, Meredith, Greagoir, his friends. He had changed in so many unexpected ways, and hurt so often because those changes weren't by choice. He pretended he had changed for the better, yet he never stood up to those who were wrong until it was too late. He thought that being strict would cover his past failures, and that denying himself the depth of his feelings for her would fix things. Fereldens who found themselves in Kirkwall congratulated him for his status. People thanked him from felling crazed mages who threatened their safety. Mages ran to him for protection from crazed mobs, with thankful tears as he dispersed crowds. Despite every mistake, and every success beneath it all Darla saw that Cullen remained Cullen. She saw the things he never did, and that stunned him deep. It felt like life being pumped back into his body. He stroked her arm, wondering if love was seeing what the other found unseeable.

Later when the sun had risen, and light poured into the room, Cullen opened the door. Behind him Darla lay in bed, her eyes staring into him the same silent plea he had stared into her almost a decade before-'You should go. You shouldn't be here. But part of me wants you here. I shouldn't'. He lingered at the door and looked over his shoulder. A fond smile came upon her face, and he felt the same on his own. Her gold eyes added something else to that plea, 'I can't help myself. I'll always feel this way'. His response could only be a silent 'I know, and neither can I." He turned, and the mabari brushed past his legs into her room. He couldn't deny he was a little jealous at that, but he possessed a remarkable ability to laugh at himself.

As Cullen left the inn and entered into another day he carried the past with him. It was no weight on his shoulders, no sin or shame as he expected. The world seemed so much brighter, not like it did when he was a boy, but clearer than it had been in years. Nothing in him had faded. The memories of experiences remained clear from the demon's touch to Meredith's crazed eyes to Darla's cries of ecstasy. Nothing had been magically erased, but he felt as though he could breathe. The road before him would be difficult, and -though it may have not been said- both he and Darla expected it may put them at odds. Cullen straightened his posture, and nodded to himself as subtle sadness rose inside. It wouldn't be pleasant, but if it happened he would be ready.

She had reminded him of himself, of what he once believed, of who he thought himself to be. There were things he had out grown and things he knew he could only keep in the past. He had learned from suffering, vigilance, from loss, strength, and from, flawed judgment, modesty. Though he missed the pure idealism of his youth he felt comfortable with who he was because underneath that young man still stirred. Young Cullen, who could hold on to hope and dreamed, not only of Apprentice Surana's body, but of heralding the righteous was a part of him. Another day was beginning and nothing had really changed after all.

_"For there is no darkness, nor death either, in the Maker's Light_

_And nothing that He has wrought shall be lost."_


End file.
